


Like a Snake Shedding Its Skin

by LonghornLetters



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: And fairly certain on the smut, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, Friends to Lovers, I'm positive on the romance, M/M, Mary is Moran, Post-His Last Vow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-08
Updated: 2015-06-29
Packaged: 2018-03-06 15:09:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 42,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3138827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LonghornLetters/pseuds/LonghornLetters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of the Magnussen fiasco, John finds himself needing to start over.  Again.  A country house, a suspicious death, and renewed proximity to Sherlock Holmes.  This is just what John needs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cut You Loose

Sherlock was right.  The East Wind does come for everyone.  John stared at the screen of Mycroft’s BlackBerry in dismay as a dead man taunted them, but instead of worrying about himself or Sherlock, all he could think of was the role a charred memory stick played in all of this.  

Everything started to unravel less than 24 hours later when the best field agents MI6 had on the payroll descended on the Holmes’s house to rake through the ashes from Christmas that had barely cooled in the grate.  They swooped out again, and the scorched remains of the AGRA memory stick disappeared behind the tinted windows of a black Jaguar.  John never saw the flash drive again, and the last time he saw Mary was only two weeks after that.

While data analysts reconstructed what John had done his best to destroy, John and Mary hovered around one another in increasingly detached and impersonal orbits.  John realized one night as he sat with his laptop trying to write something (anything) for his blog that the only thing keeping him tied to the suburbs was the prospect of their baby.  The evasions and silences that John had initially used to give himself time to find a way forward following his discovery of Mary’s past had become a gulf between them that neither one seemed interested in bridging.  He found himself thinking increasingly of Baker Street and what Sherlock was doing.  This longing, too, went unvoiced and only added to John’s detachment and disinterest.  

In this frame of mind, John answered a knock at their door one night following the whole Magnussen debacle to two men wearing identical black suits who were built like rugby forwards.  They demanded to speak with a Margaret Moran.

“No one here by that name, mate,” John answered hesitantly.  The heavy thump and drag of a full suitcase being moved in a hurry caused Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum to push past John and race for the bedroom without so much as a by-your-leave.  They reemerged mere minutes later, Mary, or Margaret John supposed, handcuffed and sandwiched securely between them.  

As they passed back through the sitting room, one of them paused just long enough to say, “Dr. Watson, someone will be by shortly to take you in for your debriefing.”

All John could do was nod numbly as a pair of suits who looked like they’d wandered away from the latest Bond movie carted his wife off into the depths of another dark-tinted black Jag.

Once the door slammed behind them, the silence in the house reached up and grabbed John around the neck.  This sort of thing was so far outside John’s wheelhouse that instead of trying to reason his way through all the implications and repercussions of what had just happened, he grabbed his phone off the arm of his chair to call the one person who could think his way out of anything (including seemingly dead-end rooftop confrontations).  He was surprised to find his screen gazing back at him with no missed calls or texts.  Not even a new email.  He scowled as he punched numbers into the phone.

“Sherlock,” John said into the voicemail when it picked up instead of his friend, “Look, um, I may need a place to stay tonight, so could I come to Baker Street?  Uh, let me know, I guess, then.”  John hung up and stared at the silent phone.  

He realized as he stood there in the quiet house that he had no idea what being taken in for debriefing would entail.  Would he be arrested as some sort of accomplice?  Would they confiscate the house?  His things?  Was he even still married if it turned out his wife was a phantom?  He stared around their living room at the artfully framed prints, tasteful wallpaper, and matching furnishings that had come to represent his life.  All that normalcy hadn’t been anything more than a front.

Another knock on the door startled him out of his thoughts, and John opened the door to find a John Neville lookalike flanked by more of MI6’s muscle.  

“Dr. Watson?” The well-dressed man asked, looking up from his phone and smiling brightly.

“Yes.  Um, come in, I guess.”  John responded, sounding less than reassured.  He led the way back into the sitting room where he dropped into an armchair with a resigned sigh.

“Oh, now, there’s no need to look so nervous,” he responded, settling comfortably on the sofa and exchanging his phone for a sleek notebook and pen.  “This won’t take a moment, then we’ll have you on your way, good as new.”  He looked up and smiled again, “Now, we already know about the runup to the, ah, incident at Appledore, but perhaps you could characterize your interaction with Ms. Moran after that.”

John shifted in his chair as he tried to come up with an answer.  What was the polite way to say staying out of a sense of obligation rather than any sort of romantic attachment?  He settled for, “We were cordial, but I think a lot of the trust was gone.”

“Mmm, I see.  That’s going to make this much easier.”  He smiled again and scribbled John’s answer in his notes.  “I understand that while you were aware that Morstan was an alias, you did not, in fact, know her original name or the details of her prior work.  Is this true?”

“Yes.  I had the memory stick, but I didn’t look at it.”  John had re-thought that decision so many times, but in the end, he knew it wouldn’t have made a speck of difference.  He knew who she was.  The rest was just so many technicalities.

“Good.”  More writing.  “Now, speaking as a medical professional, what can you tell me about the progression of Ms. Moran’s pregnancy?”

“Fine.  Yeah.  Healthy.  The baby’s scans all looked normal.  Why?”  John’s concern ratcheted up.  He may have divorced himself emotionally from Mary- Margaret, he mentally corrected- but none of this was their daughter’s fault.

“I’m sure they did, but tell me, when did you confirm the pregnancy?”  The pen hovered over the page, awaiting the next bit of information.

“A couple days after the wedding.  Before we left on our honeymoon.  What does that matter?”  John was suspicious now. 

John Neville’s governmental twin reached into his suit pocket and drew out a DNA swab kit.  “Dr. Watson, if you would be so kind as to provide us with a sample of your genetic material?  I believe her personal identity is not the only area where Ms. Moran has been less than forthcoming with you.”  He passed the paternity test kit over with an apologetic smile.

John took the kit and rolled it between his hands staring at it and pondering the implications.  His only remaining tie to the woman he’d married was suddenly much more tenuous.  In a burst of decisiveness, he pulled out the collection wand, swabbed the inside of his cheek and handed the capped sample back.  “How long would it take to know?”  

“As long as it would take me to get back to my office.  My colleagues will have already taken the other samples needed by now.  Last thing, and I’ll let you be on your way.  I’m afraid we will have to take immediate possession of this property.  National security, you understand.  I can allow you to take a few personal possessions, but my associates would need to inspect your bag.”  

John nodded numbly then turned and made his way upstairs.  The bedroom was dark and quiet, but the silence shouted in its own way about all the might-have-beens.  John pulled his duffel down from the top of the wardrobe with a sigh and mechanically shoved a few button-downs, jumpers, jeans, and personals into the bag.  A swing through the bathroom netted John his packed sponge bag.  He dropped it on top of his neatly folded clothes, added the novel he’d meant to start reading, strapped on his watch and scooped the change off his nightstand and into his pocket.  After casting a final look around the room to make sure he hadn’t forgotten anything and double-checking his wallet to be sure he had his Oyster card, John shouldered his duffel and bid a wordless farewell to his quiet life in the suburbs.

Downstairs, Thing One and Thing Two did their best to root through John’s bag without creating a hopeless mess of his neatly folded clothes.  Once they were satisfied, they nodded to each other and then to their boss.  One of them pulled an external hard drive out of his interior suit pocket and offered it to their well-dressed superior.

“Ah, yes, thank you.  I’d almost forgotten.  In an effort to allow you to preserve some sense of normalcy, we are prepared to allow you to keep your personal electronics, provided we can make a copy of the contents before you take them away with you.”

John thought it through for a moment before he agreed.  If he didn’t have his phone, he couldn’t keep trying to get in touch with Sherlock, and if, God forbid, Sherlock didn’t let him stay, he’d need the laptop to find a hotel for the night.

“Excellent.  This won’t take a moment.”  John couldn’t help but think of Desmond Llewelyn as the oldest of the three government agents currently in his sitting room grabbed his phone and then swooped down on his laptop like a tech-starved teenager.  He plugged the external drive into the laptop first, and as soon as a progress bar popped up on the screen, he turned back to John, “This is primarily a precaution, you understand.  It would seem that Ms. Moran has kept you in the dark about her _colorful_ past, but one can never be too cautious.”  The bar had crept across to completion, so he swapped the laptop for Mary’s tablet.  John had decided while he was packing that she probably wouldn’t mind too much if he took it with him.  The copy for the tablet went much faster, and a final exchange hooked his phone up to the external drive for copying.  

“Hmm, now that’s interesting.  Were you aware your phone has a third-party tracker on it?”

“What?  No.  Bloody Mycroft,” John swore moving over to grab his phone.  As if swiping the device in a fit of pique would somehow imbue him with the technological prowess to even locate the bug and then to remove it from his phone.

“No, I’m afraid it’s not one of ours, Dr. Watson.  I can remove the program, if you’d like, but I would need the data to try to figure out who’s so interested in your comings and goings.  Now that my copy is finished, my associate can remove it with no trouble.”

John shrugged, feeling more out of his depth than ever.  He watched the bloke who’d been carrying the external hard drive sweep his phone up in one meaty hand and begin navigating down through the menus and layers of the operating system to screens that eventually looked like the root command.  

“Got it, boss,” he said, smirking.  “The program’s got a component that could activate the camera and mic remotely, but it was easy enough to find.  Not hidden or anything.”  He navigated quickly back to the home screen then unplugged the phone and tossed it to John, who caught it awkwardly in his off hand.  

He glared at the blank screen, and was about to shove his mobile into his pocket, when it lit up and vibrated in his hand with an incoming text.

 

    _The upstairs bedroom is as you left it if you still need a place to stay.  SH_

 

Thank Christ.  That was one worry John could cross off his list.  

“Well, I see you have accommodations secured, and since we have no further questions tonight, you’d best be on your way.  If you don’t move along, the Tube will have stopped, and it’ll be the night bus for you.”

John grimaced, remembering how much the night bus had put him off even in his wilder youth.  There were some things best not experienced without a protective layer of alcohol, and this was one of them.  Newly motivated, he put his laptop in on top of his clothes, closed up the bag, and hefted it to his shoulder.  

“My associates and I have a bit more work to do here, but we do appreciate your time, Dr. Watson.  We’ll be in touch.”  The second enforcer escorted John to the front door, and just like that, John was cast adrift from the life he’d thought he wanted.  The life he’d found and forged in the wake of Sherlock’s abandonment.  

 

~~*~~

 

Nearly an hour and two train changes later, John found himself on the steps of 221B with all his worldly possessions on his back.  Four years and countless cases and all even though all their ups and downs, and he was still just as relieved to be here as he had been that first day.

John stepped up onto the front stoop and pressed the buzzer for the B flat.  He stood back down on the pavement to wait, shifting from foot to foot in the damp, cold midnight air.  When he didn’t get a response after a couple of minutes, he tried the knocker instead.  The faint sound of shuffling houseshoes and jingling keys from the other side of the door indicated someone had heard his knock this time.

“John!”  Mrs. Hudson’s exclamation from behind the door that she’d only opened a crack brought his focus back to the present.  “What on earth are you doing here at this time of night?  I thought you were a burglar.”  She opened the front door enough to admit him, and John hurried through, glad to finally be out of the cold.  

“I needed a place to stay, at least for tonight, and Sherlock said he didn’t mind if I came over.  I’d have thought he’d be downstairs to let me in, though.  I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“I heard him crashing about a few hours ago, but he’s been quiet up there for a while.  I thought he’d gone to bed.  He’s been up for almost two days straight.”  As if suddenly realizing that John had turned up on her doorstep after midnight carrying everything valuable he owned in the world, she added, “Did you and Mary have a bit of a domestic?”

“More than a bit, Mrs. Hudson.  I’ll just go up and get settled.  No reason to wake Sherlock if he’s asleep.”  John put his foot on the bottom stair before turning back to Mrs. Hudson, who hadn’t said anything, instead she’d just patted his arm in her motherly way and moved back into her flat.  “Thank you for letting me in.”  The ‘thank you for not prying’ went unsaid.

John made his way quietly upstairs and into their, well, Sherlock’s, flat.  When he made it up the seventeen steps to the sitting room, all the fight drained out of him, and John just collapsed on the couch.  The lamp on the low end table next to the sofa was still on so that he wouldn’t trip over anything in the dark, and it was all he could do to stand up again to grab the blanket off the back of his chair.  He stripped down to his vest and dug a ratty old pair of jogging bottoms out of his bag.  He pulled them on, folded his trousers away and clicked the light off before he laid down on the sofa.  As he rolled himself up in the blanket and buried his head in the brown and gold fleur de lis pillow, John wanted to believe that this whole situation would work out for the best, but he couldn’t help but feel that he now fell into a valley that meant he didn’t belong anywhere.


	2. Reel You In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John's back at Baker Street. Too bad you can't just snap your fingers and get what you want.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here's where the case part of this story appears. Before I go any further, I must say a heartfelt thank you to BeautifulFiction. Her advice on how to write and integrate case material into a story has been invaluable.

John woke up much earlier than he really wanted to sunlight shining full in his face through the open lounge windows and the sound of frantic typing coming from the desk.  He groaned and rolled over to face the back of the sofa, not quite ready to deal with either getting up to go find breakfast or the shambles of his marriage.

“John, you’re awake.  I’ve got a new client who should be arriving shortly.  Based on her emails it shouldn’t be completely predictable, but then, there’s not really anything new anymore.”  Sherlock’s tone was brisk and bright, but John found himself unaccountably hurt.  Sherlock was in no way obligated to ask about his feelings or about all the sordid details of the night before, but he’d thought that his friend’s natural curiosity would at least mean he wanted to inquire after what had transpired.

In lieu of starting a conversation about his fragile emotional state or about deception and perceived abandonment, John struggled to his feet and grabbed his bag.  If a client really was coming, he didn’t want to ruin her first impression of Sherlock by appearing unshaven and in his tattiest pyjamas.  If there wasn’t a client, John could at least escape Sherlock’s indifferent attitude and lick his wounds in the privacy of his old room.

He dragged his entire duffel into the bathroom with him, stripped down, and got under the hottest water he could stand.  Under the spray, John took time to try to think through everything that had happened in the last 12 hours.  He didn’t know what was going to come of this whole arrest and investigation, but he didn’t see how he could return to Mary - Margaret - a second time.  He had spent so much time and energy rationalizing his way to taking her back after she shot his best friend and covered up her past that he just didn’t have anything more to dedicate to renewing their relationship a second time.  Somehow, he thought, even if he did decide to reconcile, Mycroft would have a thing or twelve to say about the subject.  

John shut off the water with a more forceful twist of the taps than was strictly necessary, and got out to face the rest of his day.  He brushed his teeth, shaved, and dressed in clean jeans and a fresh shirt.

Pulling his maroon cardigan on to ward off the chill in the rest of the flat, he made his way back down the hall and into the lounge.  Sherlock glanced up at him and quirked his lips into a small half smile.  John noticed the tea tray on the end table and went to make himself a cup.  He silently chastised himself for expecting Sherlock, emotionally distant at the best of times, to be a beacon of sympathetic understanding if he refused to speak himself.  

John had just settled into his chair to brood when Mrs. Hudson tapped on the doorframe, “Good morning, boys, your client’s here.”  She moved aside and a young lady in her mid-twenties stepped through.  “I’ll bring you up some more tea, then, shall I?”

Sherlock nodded, and his landlady disappeared downstairs.  Their guest had made her way over to the desk and drawn out the spare chair and dragged it over so she could sit near both John and Sherlock.  

John had to look away as she settled herself, but then he blushed, realizing Sherlock had probably noticed and drawn his own conclusions.  If he tried to pretend that nothing was wrong, Sherlock would see through that too.  Caught in a maelstrom of indecision, John dithered in silent agony until he felt a pair of strong hands press the notebook he’d left behind during the Magnussen fiasco into his hands.

“My colleague, Dr. Watson, keeps a blog for posterity or publicity or some such nonsense, and he’d misplaced the notebook he brings with him on cases.  Now, tell us in your own time why you insisted on taking an early train to call at seven in the morning.”  John took his notebook and flipped through it to find the first blank page.  If Sherlock didn’t want him here to commiserate with him, then he at least wanted John here for The Work.   

“What?  Train?  How did you know?”  The young lady asked, surprised, but not angry.  She was looking at Sherlock like someone had answered all her prayers in one go.

Sherlock opened his mouth to respond with one of his fluid streams of deductive reasoning, but John, already prickly from a terrible night’s sleep and the cursory treatment he’d been receiving from the person who was supposed to be his friend, cut in, “He’s quite good at what he does, Miss, er,”

“Roylott.  Helen Roylott.”

“Miss Roylott.  So, if you could?”  Sherlock was staring at him as if he’d grown another head, but John blocked off that avenue of conversation by pointedly bending over his notes and refusing to  make eye contact with Sherlock or their client.

Miss Roylott looked between the two of them, unsure what exactly was going on, but determined to see her visit through now that she had finally worked up the nerve to come. “Yes, well, I’m sorry to say that my predicament is so bizarre that I hardly know where to begin.”  

“Just tell us everything you know as completely as you can, and let us put the pieces together.” Sherlock advised, sitting back and steepling his fingers in front of his mouth.  

“Right.  Well, I suppose this whole mess starts with my mum.  She works for the BBC in their Middle East division, so she spends a lot of time abroad.  While she was on one of these trips, she met my dad.  He was some hotshot City boy his bank had sent out to do some kind of on-site work in oil, but he adored my mum and her free spirit right from the start.  My sister and I were their only kids, and we were happy for quite a while together.”

“What happened?”  The question popped out before John could stop it, making him blush as both Sherlock and Miss Roylott turned in surprise at the outburst.  John just chalked it up to his current fixation on imploding relationships and waved them off and resumed staring intently at the pages of his notebook.

“Oh, nothing truly sordid, I assure you.  He was in a traffic incident with a driver who was intoxicated, and his injuries were quite severe.  He died en route to the hospital.”  Even though she spoke with the clinical detachment of a police report, John noticed she squeezed her fingers together in her lap like the wounds were still fresh.

“And this brings us to your current situation?”  Sherlock prompted from behind his hands.  

“Yes.  My mother remarried a few years ago.  A doctor this time.  He seemed nice enough at first.”  

Sherlock quirked an eyebrow in question, “At first?  Explain.”

“Just that.  He was polite to my sister and me while he and mum were dating, but once they were married, he changed.  He was so short tempered all the time, especially when it came to money.  He said mum needed to stop gallivanting off to the far side of the world and get a desk job; that they paid more and wouldn’t leave him to foot the bills all alone.  He started insinuating that my wanting to be a primary school teacher and Lydia’s job as a PA weren’t good enough for any daughters of his.  He said our father would be mortified right along with him, which is patently untrue.”  

“Could it be that he’s just concerned?” John offered.  “Most teachers don’t make that much.  And a job as a PA isn’t exactly a career.”

“Yes, but Dr. Watson, this isn’t his choice to make.  Lydia and I are both adults, with trust funds no less.  I can afford to be a teacher because I want to, not because I have to in order to keep the gas on, but he said that teaching just meant I wasn’t well qualified enough to do anything else.  Lydia didn’t know what she wanted to do yet, but she thought she’d make a good wife and mum.  She’d been seeing someone, he was in the navy, and she was so excited when she told us about him.  Oh, Mr. Holmes, you should have seen the row that caused.  He was convinced no one would want to marry Lydia for anything except her money.  She wouldn’t hear it.  She told him that she had enough good sense to not let the money our dad worked so hard to earn and that she’d worked so hard to save go to some good for nothing layabout.  Her man wasn’t like that; he was going places.” She fished a tissue out of her purse and dabbed at eyes that had filled with tears.  

Sherlock folded himself further down into his chair saying, “Surely, Miss Roylott, you didn’t come here to discuss the minutia of your interpersonal relationship with your stepfather?  What, exactly, has got you so worried?”

“Right.  Yes.”  She wiped her eyes one last time and clenched her fists in her lap.  “Well, a few months ago, she and I were sitting up in my room talking about her Michael.  He was due home on leave the next day and they had planned to take a mini break up to Scotland.  She was so sure he was going to propose.”  She smiled wistfully at the memory.

He admired Helen’s willingness to believe that this Michael was all he claimed to be, but the idealism of young love struck John as tragically simple.  He couldn’t help but admire Lydia’s willingness to begin a life with this man and Helen’s belief that they could find happiness, but really, how well could anyone truly know another person.  How could Lydia have known she could trust him.  John tried to shake off his morbid line of thought and refocus on Helen’s story.  He would have to deal with his own problems soon enough.

“We didn’t stay up too late, the doctor would get shirty if we were awake talking when he wanted to go to sleep, so we decided to go to bed a little after ten.  Just before she left, she wanted to know if I’d heard any whistling the past few nights.  She said she’d been waking up to whistling in the early hours of the morning.  Three or so.  She couldn’t really tell if it was coming from the hall or the lawn or where, but that it scared her.  I told her no, but that I was a sound sleeper.  I convinced her it was probably just some bird and not to worry so much about it.  She was just nervous because Michael was going to meet our mum and the doctor when he came home.  We agreed it was probably nothing and she went to her room and locked the door.”

“Wait, did she always lock the door?” Sherlock asked, perking up from where he’d been letting his head loll back against the headrest of his chair.

John smirked that Sherlock chose to focus on locked doors out of that whole description.  This entire situation seemed fishy already, but he couldn’t put his finger on quite why.  The doctor sounded like a bit of a heel, but John couldn’t decide if he really was as rude as Helen claimed or if she was exaggerating to play on their sympathy.  If that was her plan, though, she had come to the wrong place.  A self-proclaimed sociopath and a bitter not-quite, maybe divorcee.  They were certainly the paragons of empathy.

“Yes.  It’s something she and I have both done since we were teenagers.  Public school habit, I guess.  You develop those kinds of routines after living in dorms long enough.”

“Hmm.  Unusual to maintain the habit at home, though.”  Sherlock blinked slowly, presumably filing the tidbit about locked doors and dorm living in his mind palace.  He waved a hand, encouraging Miss Roylott to continue.

“You know, Mr. Holmes, how strong the power of suggestion can be.  Once she’d turned me on to this whistling, I couldn’t get it out of my head.  I went to my own room and tossed and turned for hours.  I was worried about her, my work, Michael’s impending visit, this mystery whistling.  Just everything.  I had finally managed to doze off when I heard this awful shrieking coming from Lydia’s room.  She sounded like she was in agony.  I ran for her room as fast as I could.  In the hall between her room and mine, I heard that whistle she’d been telling me about and some kind of metal banging noise.  Like the door of a safe slamming closed.  The noises sounded like they were coming from further down the hall, from the direction of the doctor’s room.”  

Sherlock nodded vaguely.  John couldn’t tell if that meant he was following Miss Roylott’s story or not, but he kept scribbling down points as she talked.  It was nice, he realized, to have something to focus on besides his own life.  The young lady’s stepfather sounded like a right piece of work, and hopefully this case would be stimulating enough to catch Sherlock’s eye so they could spend time doing the one thing that seemed to allow them to communicate with each other.

“When I got to her room,” she continued, “The door was hanging open and the lock on the outside of the door was broken, like someone had tried to force it.  Now I was truly scared.  Lydia came stumbling out into the hall, but she couldn’t make her arms and legs work right.  As if someone had drugged her.  I grabbed her around the waist and tried to help her back to bed, but she collapsed into some sort of seizure or fit or something before I could get her comfortable again.  She was screaming and kept trying to say something, but she couldn’t seem to get the words out. Then all of a sudden, all her muscles seemed to contract at once, and she lost consciousness.  Dr. Roylott tried to resuscitate her, but nothing worked.  My only sister was dead by two that morning.”  Helen Roylott, to her credit, did not burst into a flood of hysterical crying at the end of her retelling.  Instead, she sat stoically and twisted her tissue between her hands and waited for Sherlock’s response.

“This all sounds fascinating, but the coroner’s inquest should have all the answers you need,” Sherlock said standing and making towards the kitchen to refill his tea.

John, not wanting to let this opportunity slip away, decided to do some digging of his own.  “Surely you’ve already had an inquest, or you would be consulting the police?”

“Yes.  The inquest found that while her death was ‘unusual’ nothing indicated a homicide.”  Helen grimaced at the words, clearly not in agreement with the coroner’s findings.  

“It’s been months since her death.  Any evidence would be long gone by now,” was Sherlock’s dismissive response.  He wandered back over to his chair and perched with his new cup of tea.  “I hardly see what help I could provide in this case, Miss Roylott.”

“I mainly want a second opinion.  The police never even looked at her room.  They assumed she’d forced her own lock in her panic, and that I’m overreacting to the whole situation.  Please, Mr. Holmes, if you’d just come take a look and give me your input, I can pay for your travel and lodging expenses.”

Sherlock closed his eyes, and John could practically see the wheels turning as he pondered Miss Roylott’s story.  Even though he knew it was a selfish desire, John silently willed him to find the case interesting enough to pursue.  Her story was peculiar, John couldn’t think of any drugs that would work as quickly as what seemed to have happened to Lydia.  

“Miss Roylott,” Sherlock’s voice broke into John’s thoughts, “I cannot guarantee that I will be able to provide you with anything more since your sister’s death was five months ago--”

“Just a second look is all I’m after, Mr. Holmes.  I’ve not touched her room, nor has anyone else.  I think I’m just after some closure.”

Sherlock seemed to come to a decision and nodded, “We’ll come down on the early train tomorrow.”

“Thank you, Mr. Holmes.  I have a few other errands today, but I’ll stop back by this afternoon with a list of hotels in our area for your trip.”  Helen Roylott smiled gratefully at Sherlock as she stood to leave.

After the door to the street slammed behind her, Sherlock stood and pulled his burgundy dressing gown around himself saying, “This should be passably intriguing, even if her story was a bit melodramatic.”

“Melodramatic my arse,” John groaned as he pulled his phone out of his pocket to check for missed calls to try to hide his eye roll.  Bugger.  A missed call from Mycroft.  That could only be about Margaret and the baby.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like to update this every other week at the longest (real life permitting, obviously). Thank you for all of your kudos and comments, they add fuel to my fire.


	3. Put You Off

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please be aware, there is a brief mention of physical intimidation between a step-parent and adult step-child. I'd much rather over-warn than have someone stumble into something that makes them uncomfortable. 
> 
> Before we proceed, many thanks to Kestrel337. She is the best, most supportive writing partner I could ever ask for. This challenge I've set for myself is infinitely less daunting because of her.

John decided to return Mycroft’s call in the privacy of his upstairs bedroom.  That way, he wouldn’t feel like Sherlock was scrutinizing his every facial tic as he spoke and he could put off Mrs. Hudson’s well-intentioned pity.  Well, he reasoned as he dialled, he could delay these things for at least a little while.

“Ah, John, so glad you could return my call promptly,” Mycroft’s cool voice came over the phone.

“Sure.  Um, I told the gents who came to the house last night everything I knew,” John responded, feeling guarded already.  “I don’t really know what else I can tell you at this point.”

“Certainly.  You were most helpful.  I wanted to provide you with the follow-up to some of your inquiries my associate was unable to address immediately last night.”  Mycroft could have been discussing the weather for all the concern he showed.

John took a deep breath and plunged into what he really wanted to know, “Am I still married and is the baby mine?”

Mycroft’s smirk was practically audible, “Oh, John.  Still the brave soldier, I see.  I can provide you information on both of those fronts.”  The soft sound of paper rustling meant Mycroft was turning through his trusty notebook.  “Margaret Moran, better known to you as Mary Morstan, is being held under the 2008 Counter-Terrorism Act.  Before we can do anything, though, we must work with the Americans concerning a pending extradition request from the NSA.  Should you decide to, ah, terminate your connection to Ms. Moran, a solicitor will be provided to you at the expense of Her Majesty’s government.”

John nodded as if Mycroft could see him from the other end of the phone, but he needed to hear it all before he made any sort of decision.  He clenched his free hand in frustration, still not understanding how these kinds of things happened to him.  “And the baby?”  He asked stiffly.

Mycroft coughed, and John realized it was him buying time.  He almost cut in, but at the last moment, he restrained himself and gave Mycroft time.  That way, there was no doubt.

“The DNA testing process determined your acquaintance, Mr. John Woodley, to be the father of Ms. Moran’s unborn child.”  Mycroft’s tone had taken on an even more detached air than normal, trying to mask pity John suspected.  He wondered why it wasn’t possible to reach through the phone and punch someone.  He didn’t need anyone’s pity right now, least of all Mycroft.

“I don’t even _know_ a John Woodley,” John answered in a bitten off voice.  By now, he just wanted the conversation to end.  

“He is an associate of Ms. Moran.  You would probably know him better as David.  That appears to be the identity he established for himself when the pair of them went rogue.”

All of a sudden, Mycroft’s smooth, unaffected voice was more than John could handle, “Mycroft, look, Sherlock and I have a case on, so if there’s nothing else?”

“Certainly, John.  Until next time.”  Mycroft rung off without another word.

John stared at the phone in his hand for a good minute before he dropped it on the bedside table and collapsed onto the bed, throwing his arm over his eyes.  “Why does this always happen to me?”  He shouted at the empty room.  “Goddamn it!”  John threw his phone across the room and slammed himself back down on the mattress.   

He knew, logically, that he and Mary wouldn’t be able to recover from this latest, more personal, betrayal.  Not knowing a person’s past had been one thing, but this, lying about the here and now, and for nothing more than self-interest, this John couldn’t get past.  He shut his eyes to try to block out the conversation he’d just had with Mycroft, but once his eyes were closed, tears of anger and frustration began to leak out.  

John gave himself an hour.  One hour to lay in bed and let all the anger and self-recrimination and misery wash over him unchecked.  To not worry what he looked like or who saw or heard.    

When his time was up, John took a deep, calming breath, stood up, and picked up his thankfully undamaged phone, and went back downstairs to the loo.  He blew his nose, washed his face, re-combed his hair, and when he looked in the mirror, he felt moderately more prepared to face the world and The Work.

Sherlock was still sat at his computer when John reemerged from the bathroom, and he didn’t even turn at the sound of John’s footsteps in the hall.  John stopped and just looked at his friend, who was now clicking around on what looked like some sort of professional social networking site, before he decided to stop in the kitchen for some food and something to drink.  He scrounged the makings for a sandwich out from around what looked like three separate experiments in the fridge, and set the kettle to boil while he put lunch together.

“Sherlock, tea?”  He offered in an effort to seem more congenial than he had since he’d washed up on Baker Street’s doorstep late last night.

“Mmm, not right now, John,” came the absent reply from the sitting room.

John nodded, practically to himself, and returned his attention to the half-assembled sandwich in front of him.  Keeping his hands busy allowed his mind to wander, but instead of falling back onto the well-worn circle of Mary/Margaret, baby, spies, lies, he settled on Sherlock.  In the light of day, and on the other side of pitching an astonishingly relieving wobble, John forced himself to reevaluate Sherlock’s behaviour after MI6’s finest had shown up to arrest his wife.  Sherlock’s distance, while constant, did not necessarily indicate disinterest.  His studious avoidance of John’s arrival had allowed John to process the immediate aftermath without incisive, all-seeing eyes watching.  Offering the chance to jump straight into a case this morning gave him the chance to escape, even if it was only for a little while.  John sighed as he moved to transfer the hot water from the kettle to his mug.  Sherlock had really been wrong.  It wasn’t only John who kept Sherlock right; Sherlock spent plenty of time keeping _him_  right as well.  

He took his plate and mug into the lounge and settled into the desk chair at Sherlock’s left elbow.  He ate and Sherlock clicked and typed for a few minutes in companionable silence.  

“What’re you looking for?”  He asked around a mouthful of food.  

“Dr. Roylott’s professional standing.  Drugs, debt, malpractice, the lot.  He would have a hard time being both the squeaky clean small town doctor that his professional profiles would claim and the wicked stepfather at home.  There would be bleedthrough.”  Sherlock’s clicking and typing increased in pace by a fraction; it was the only sign he was not finding what he expected.

“Not necessarily,” John countered, “He could be one of those types who keeps it all buttoned up at work, but doesn’t mind letting fly at home.  My dad was like that.  Nicest guy you’d ever meet on a building site, but at home he could be a nightmare, especially if you tried to argue with him once he’d put his foot down.”

Sherlock turned the full light of his scrutiny on John in response to his outburst.  It was all John could do not to shrink under Sherlock’s gaze, but he brazened it out, determined to let Sherlock look and see him.  

“Peacemaker,” was Sherlock’s one-word assessment before he turned back to his laptop.  He, however, didn’t say it with the same derisive tone Harry had used when he tried to calm their father down after her disastrous “I’m bringing my girlfriend over to Sunday dinner” announcement when she was 17.  He didn’t use the same defeated tone as Nick had in Uni when John’s excuses about not bringing him home to meet his parents finally wore thin.  Sherlock was matter-of-fact, seeming to understand all the effort behind the tightrope John had walked his entire life.

John rose to take his now empty dishes back to the kitchen, and he’d just started filling the sink when an insistent pounding at the street door made them both look around startled.  Sherlock made absolutely no move to get up, turning back to his laptop as if nothing had happened.  John dried his hands, and was heading for the door to the stairs, when the sound of Mrs. Hudson’s light tread on the stairs stopped him in the middle of the sitting room.

A tall, broad-chested man followed her up the stairs and pushed rudely past her into their sitting room.  He scowled as he took in the room and its two occupants, then turned to Mrs. Hudson.

“You can leave,” he said brusquely.  She made a rather pointed eye contact with Sherlock before she turned and scuttled back down the stairs.  John rolled his eyes.  This brute obviously didn’t know who he was dealing with when it came to their landlady.  “Which one of you is Sherlock Holmes?” he demanded, glaring at both of them in turn.

“I am,” Sherlock responded calmly, meeting their guest’s gaze without so much as blinking, “And you are?”

“Dr. Emerson Roylott,” he shot back as he stepped into Sherlock’s space.

“Why don’t you have a seat and tell us why you’re here, mate,” John interjected.  Sherlock’s assessment from earlier flashed across his mind.

“Piss off, you,” he snapped at John.  “And you,” he continued, stepping even closer to Sherlock, “What has Helen been in here lying about this time?”

“John, we haven’t had a decent case in _ages_ ,” Sherlock complained as he moved away from the desk, and flopped into the Corbusier, the picture of anguished ennui.  He excavated a box of nicotine patches from under a mess of papers on the end table and casually slapped one on his arm.  He gazed blankly at Dr. Roylott and let the silence settle around them.  The doctor broke first.

“I just want to know what she’s been saying to you.”  Dr. Roylott’s voice dropped so suddenly into a reasonable register that John actually looked over to be sure this was still the same man.  “She’s ill.  In the head.  Delusions, things that aren’t there.  And, if you can believe it, she’s a pathological liar.  I just worry that she’s out causing more trouble than she could possibly handle.  You know,” here, he appealed to John, “what a father’s love can be like.”

John didn’t even hesitate, “No, I don’t.”

“Dr. Roylott,” Sherlock broke in, clearly already bored with their guest’s shoddy attempts at manipulation, “I don’t know why you’re under the impression that I’ve met your Helen, so unless there’s something else, I’d suggest showing yourself out before I’d be forced to summon the police.”

Dr. Roylott scowled at both Sherlock and John before he pointed at Sherlock.  “Don’t think I don’t know who you are.  You’re that fraud detective with the drug habit.  I’ve heard you even killed a man in cold blood on the steps of his own home.  Everyone knows you stick your nose in where it doesn’t belong and you bring nothing but trouble.”  

He walked over to the fireplace and snatched up the poker Sherlock had left on the floor earlier that week.  Dr. Roylott stalked over until he was looming over Sherlock, who was still lounging indolently in his chair.  “If you think you’re going to get involved in my family’s private affairs, you can rest absolutely sure that you will regret it.”  He held the fire iron up at Sherlock’s eye level and bent it into a vee.  His voice dropped into a menacing growl, “If I can do that to this, just _imagine_ what I can do to _you_.”

Dr. Emerson Roylott threw the damaged poker on the floor at Sherlock’s feet, stomped over to the sitting room door and vanished down the stairs after a final, poisonous glare at the pair of them.  

Once the outside door slammed, John uncrossed his arms to grab their ruined poker, “Well, I guess this is for the bin.  What a dick.  I was convinced Helen was exaggerating about this guy when she was here before, but now, I’m not so sure.”  John glanced at Sherlock, his face full of uncertainty, “D’you really think we should be getting involved in this?  This guy seems like a right nutjob.”

“Oh, John,” Sherlock smirked and jumped up to snatch the tool out of John’s hands.  “You can’t possibly imagine I’d be dissuaded by mere physical force, do you?”  While he’d been speaking, Sherlock made his way back over to the fireplace, unbent the poker like it was a pipe cleaner and hung it back on the rack with the rest of the set.  “I think this case might be worth looking into.”

~~*~~

John Watson and Sherlock Holmes spent the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon in companionable silence.  Every time John looked over, Sherlock was prodding industriously at an internet browser that looked like it had 20 tabs open.  John took some time to unpack his things and resettle in his room.  Once he’d finished that, he read the discreetly titled document on marriage fraud that had shown up in his inbox.  According to Mycroft, or whichever PA was sending emails on Mycroft’s behalf, all John had to do was say the word and his marriage would be officially and unobtrusively dissolved.  Like it had never even happened.

John sighed and laid his reading down.  Even though he knew he should be trying to absorb all of the dense legalese in order to try to make sense of his options, the words just passed over him and nothing hooked into his brain.  Mycroft’s help, however well intended, was more than he could handle.  Maybe tomorrow.  John let his eyes fall closed, and he slipped into a light doze, snapping back awake when Sherlock set a mug gently down on the table next to his elbow.

“Tea,” Sherlock said, pointing to the mug of milky tea.  “Miss Roylott should be back soon, but I’ll need to clarify something before we take this case.”

John took a sip of the tea Sherlock brought him, and realized with a glance at his watch that he’d let the afternoon get away from him, and he didn’t really have anything productive to show for it.  He put his tablet aside and went to see about something to go with his drink.  Their client should be back soon, so he should just have time to finish his tea and a biscuit.

Helen Roylott returned just before dinner with a list of accommodations in the Leatherhead area.  Sherlock met her at the door with a disapproving scowl.

“You haven’t been completely honest with us, have you, Miss Roylott?”  Sherlock gestured for her to forego the wooden chair she’d used before and instead to take John’s chair.  John wandered back in from the kitchen to see what this new commotion was all about.

“I-I don’t know what you mean,” she stammered, looking at them both with wide, frightened eyes.  

She let Sherlock catch her right wrist and he pushed up the sleeve on her coat to reveal deep, purple bruises in the clear shape of a hand.  “Now, Miss Roylott,” Sherlock said, “Why didn’t you tell us the good doctor has been manhandling you like this?”

“He-I...I didn’t think it mattered.  I’m here for my sister, not for myself; I know who did this to me.  There’s no mystery there.”  She snatched her arm back and rolled her sleeve down again, her jerky actions giving the lie to her matter-of-fact tone.  “Besides,” she continued, “It’s not news to me that he can get rough when he’s angry.  I’m sure he just doesn’t know his own strength sometimes.”

“Miss Roylott,” Sherlock began in a gentle, but reproachful, tone, “If you’re going to engage my services, I would appreciate honesty.”  She nodded, and Sherlock seemed to see something in her eyes that he trusted.  He continued in his tone that indicated he was fully engaged in a case, “This is quite an interesting little story, especially since your charming stepfather stopped by personally to warn me off.  I’d like to come down to Leatherhead tomorrow to take a look, if that would work.”

“Oh, thank you!”  Helen Roylott was all effusive gratitude as she jumped up and shook first Sherlock and then John’s hand.  “That’s perfect.  I’ll email you the address for the house tonight, and I’ll be working at home tomorrow, so you can just give me a ring when you get in.”  

Helen turned to go, and John walked her to the street door, but grabbed her elbow just as she reached for the handle, “Do you have someplace safe to stay tonight?  Where Dr. Roylott can’t lay hands on you.”

She turned back and nodded, “Yes, I’m staying with friends in town tonight after going to a show.  Thank you for worrying, Dr. Watson.”  She smiled softly before slipping out the door and into the London dusk.

John made his way back upstairs, and when he entered the flat, Mrs. Hudson was fussing over a tray of shepherd’s pie.  The moment John was through the door, she hustled him over to the desk and urged him into a seat.  

“You look a bit better than you did last night, John,” she said as she put a plate and silverware down in front of him.  “Get some real food in you, and you’ll be a new man.”  She spoke with the confidence born of experience, and John couldn't help but smile at her continued kindness.

After dinner, John went back to his tablet, but instead of returning to his reading from earlier, he settled for turning on _The Magnificent Seven_ and watching it with just one earbud in on the off chance Sherlock needed him.  Meanwhile, Sherlock moved around the room, flitting between his laptop and the bookshelf, intent upon some sort of research. John barely made it an hour into his movie before he felt his eyes starting to droop.

“I’m going to bed,” John announced, standing and stretching.  “What time are we leaving tomorrow?”

“Mid-morning should be fine,” Sherlock responded without bothering to look up from his screen.

“Right.  Goodnight, then,” John said.  He dragged himself up the stairs to his room and stripped down to just his pants before collapsing into bed.  His last thought before he closed his eyes was how grateful he was for Sherlock’s refusal to coddle him.  He didn't think he could bear it if he lost his dearest friend to the black hole that his marriage had become.

 


	4. Two Sides to Every Story

John blinked slowly awake from a deep, dreamless sleep to sunlight streaming through the window and across his face, but instead of jumping up to begin the day, he laid in bed to let the quiet give him time to think.  Once he’d pushed through his own histrionics, he felt much more prepared to make decisions about what he wanted from his future.  

John rolled over and pulled the duvet up around his neck.  In the morning peace, he could let his thoughts spin out at their own pace.  Lies.  His married life had been built on lies.  He had wanted so badly to move on and heal after Sherlock’s death, and Mary had come along in perfect time.  Too perfect, clearly, now that he knew who she really was.  He shook his head.  No, it hadn’t been just his married life that was built on lies.  Sherlock had contributed his fair share as well.  

When Sherlock returned, John had been so hesitant to let him back into his life.  He had been surprised his friend had continued to devote himself wholeheartedly to John’s wellbeing.  Sherlock’s generosity after his return had come as a shock to John.  He’d ensured the wedding had gone off without a hitch.  He’d never once demanded John choose him or a case over Mary, which, in hindsight should have been a bit of a hint.  This morning of introspection had finally led him to the realization that what made Sherlock’s deceit different from Mary’s was a question of motive.  Selflessness versus selfishness.  

Now what he wanted was to put the lies behind him.  Not the way he had claimed to put his time with Sherlock behind him and move on with Mary.  That two year stretch was tainted with a haze of sadness and anger over what he’d thought was his inability to save his friend from whatever demons had driven him over that ledge.  John knew he’d turned all of that rage and hurt inward, and taking the first route out, without asking any questions, had done him no favours.  Now, he told himself, it was vital that he learn from his mistakes and not squander the second chance fate had given him.  

Checking the clock and seeing that it was already gone nine, John got up and went to the wardrobe to pack an overnight bag and find clothes that would be practical for sitting on a train and traipsing all over who knew where with Sherlock today.  Once he had his bag ready, he dressed and ran his fingers through his hair to try to bring some order to the hair that was stuck up on one side from where he’d slept on it.  Stopping to grab his phone and tuck the charger in an outside pocket, he noticed a voicemail from around two that morning from an unidentified number.  He rolled his eyes at Mycroft’s inability to conduct covert business at anything other than dark thirty at night and stuffed his phone in his pocket.

“Sherlock?”  John called as he traipsed down the stairs, “Why can’t your brother give me updates on his investigation at a decent hour?”

“Most likely to distract himself from breaking his diet in the dead of night,” came Sherlock’s disinterested reply.  “Would you be ready to leave soon, there’s a train in less than an hour.”

“Yeah, sure.  I’m packed, so ready when you are.”  John paused in the kitchen to inspect the remains of what looked like Mrs. Hudson’s latest attempt to get some breakfast into Sherlock.  He scavenged a cup of tea and some still warm toast and bacon before he went to see what Sherlock was up to.

Sherlock was sat in front of his computer, clicking through a website of what looked like caravan sites and jotting down notes every so often.

John shook his head, “No, I am not staying on a caravan site.  I’ve seen that rubbish on Top Gear, and that is not my idea of a pleasant trip.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Sherlock retorted, rolling his eyes.  He slammed the laptop shut and jumped up, “We need to go if we’re going to be on time.  I’ll explain on the way.”

 

~~*~~

 

Once they were settled on the train, Sherlock started prodding industriously at his phone.  John sat idly watching him, and he realized that sitting here in companionable silence on their way to a case was the first time he’d felt them both settle naturally into their old relationship.  There was none of the tension of lies and secrets or the frenetic energy of trying to prove a point to one another.  John watched Sherlock text, his forehead wrinkled in concentration, and he was thankful that the quiet camaraderie that had grown so readily between them seemed to be seeping back into their life together.  

“John,” Sherlock said, breaking into his reverie, “What do you know about the Traveler population?”

John thought for a moment before he conceded, “Not much, I’m afraid.  I do know they’re pretty close-knit, don’t seem to like outsiders too much.  Why?”

“Your earlier concern about staying on a caravan site.  There’s apparently a semi-permanent Traveler community that lives in the area, and some of them have been quite vociferous in their displeasure about Dr. Roylott’s professional services.”  Sherlock passed over his phone which was open to a website proclaiming it was the trusted site for healthcare reviews.  He tapped on Dr. Roylott’s name, and the site that came up bore his picture, areas of specialisation, and reviews from patients.  There were more than a few uncomplimentary testimonials, complaining of everything from long waits for test results to brusque and intimidating bedside manner to shoddy bookkeeping and office practices.  Clearly Dr. Roylott was not going to be winning any sort of awards, but would this lead to murder?  John wasn’t so sure.

“You’re thinking Lydia’s attack could have been some kind of revenge thing?”  John asked, dismayed at the prospect.  He passed Sherlock’s phone back over saying, “I don’t think anyone would murder a bloke’s daughter over his second-rate professionalism.  Seems a bit personal.”

“You know my methods.  I cannot discount any options yet, but there are multiple reviews that point specifically to ethnically insensitive behaviour on the part of our good doctor, as well as several that contain language along the lines of ‘living to regret’ his actions.”  Sherlock looked at John over the top of his phone as if to say we both know what that means.  

“That doesn’t mean one of them did it,” John protested.  “Especially since it’s not like any of them mention a relative dying or anything.  That would seem more likely to me.  An eye for an eye sort of thing.”

“Mmm, true,” Sherlock conceded, “But, still, we can’t rule anything out yet.”  

John nodded in silent concession to Sherlock’s logic, but he still didn’t feel like anything anyone had complained about in regard to Dr. Roylott merited murdering his younger stepdaughter.  John wasn’t even completely convinced her death was murder at all.  He wanted to see the coroner’s report to try to rule out reactions like allergies and drug interactions.

“Helen said she would have a copy of the coroner’s report for us at the house,” Sherlock said in response to the thoughtful expression on John’s face.  “I’m not convinced it was murder either,” Sherlock continued after a moment’s considered silence, “But murder or no, this whole situation has me intrigued.”

They lapsed into silence, and John, not wanting to disturb Sherlock who was once again focussed on his phone, fished his battered copy of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy out of his bag and flipped pages until he found the one that was dog eared to mark his place.  He decided about halfway through the chapter that being able to just pick up and restart his life on his own terms was an appealing idea.  He sighed at the sudden feeling of relief from settling on a fresh start, with the person who’d made it interesting in the first place.  He smiled to himself at the idea of galavanting around space with Sherlock with nothing but a towel and a talking guidebook.  At the chapter break, he looked up at Sherlock to find that he had pocketed his phone and was staring out the window, seemingly lost in thought.   

In moments like this one, Sherlock looked so much softer and unguarded.  Simply wandering his mind palace instead of searching for some obscure fact stripped his veneer of assumed indifference and gave his expression a more wearily introspective cast.  This, John thought, was probably who Greg caught glimpses of when he insisted that Sherlock had the potential to become a good man.  After everything that had happened with Moriarty and Mary and Magnussen, Sherlock’s willingness to sacrifice over and over again for the people he cared about left John with absolutely no doubt that Sherlock was a good man.  A man that John was in no hurry to leave again.

The overhead speaker announcing that they were approaching their destination snapped Sherlock out of his thoughts and pushed his mask back in place.  John put his book away, and they both rose to disembark.

 

~~*~~

 

“They’re not hard up for cash, are they?”  John remarked, gaping at the size of the house as they made their way up the walk to the front door.  “Whose idea d’you think this monstrosity was?”

“Dr. Roylott’s I’m sure,” Sherlock replied with a smirk.  “He’s the sort who married money, so he feels the need to show it off in an effort to establish himself as an influential member of a community where he isn’t a native.  You’ve met him.  A loud, overbearing personality like his means he feels a need to be the most dominant man in the neighbourhood.  You can be sure he drives some sort of obviously expensive car too.  An Audi if he’s got City aspirations, but a Range Rover if he wants to appear more willing to embrace a country life.”

“What’s it mean if he’s got both?”  John asked, pointing to the garage housing a black Audi R8 and the silver Range Rover parked in the turnout of the driveway.  “That he’s got more money than sense?”

Sherlock laughed, “It means he’s trying to keep both options open until he can decide which venue has more to offer him.  Quite mercenary of him, I must say.”  He stepped under the overhang and rang the doorbell.  

Helen Roylott opened the door and smiled in greeting.  “Come right in.  Just leave your things by the door,” she said, indicating the alcove in the entryway.  They hung up their coats where she’d pointed and followed her down a hallway and into a cozy family room.  “My stepfather’s here, and he told me this morning that he’s quite anxious to speak with you again.”

“Mr. Holmes, Dr. Watson,” Dr. Roylott came through from the kitchen and shook both of their hands enthusiastically in welcome.  John wasn’t quite sure how this was the same man who had shown up at Baker Street only yesterday and threatened them both with violence.  

“Um, yes, hello,” John said trying to put forth the same effort at conviviality their host seemed willing to extend.  Sherlock, by contrast, stood next to him in stony silence.

“I want to apologize for my unspeakable behaviour yesterday.  Helen and I were both devastated by Lydia’s sudden death, and I had hoped we were starting to put all the unpleasantness behind us.  You understand, Mr. Holmes, surely, as such a close study of the human heart.”  He  seemed genuinely apologetic, so John was willing to put his reaction the previous day down as nothing more than heightened emotion.  John knew he certainly couldn’t cast aspersions after having put his best effort into breaking his best friend’s nose in a fit of betrayed rage.

Sherlock’s smile was all teeth.  “Yes, doctor, you’re quite right.  What people are willing to do in the name of love never ceases to amaze me.”

“Miss Roylott,” John broke in trying to get them back on the track, “Sherlock said you had a copy of the coroner’s report?”

“Oh, yes, would you like to see it?  It’s just upstairs.”  Helen skirted around the edge of the room and disappeared up the stairs.

“Gentlemen, please, make yourselves at home.  Can I get you anything?  Tea?  Coffee?  Something stronger?”  Dr. Roylott called from where he’d retreated back to the kitchen to retrieve his unfinished tea.

“No thanks,” John answered after a glance at Sherlock who continued to simply stand silently looking around at the carefully decorated interior.

“Well, do sit down.”  The doctor settled himself in a squashy leather club chair and gestured at the sofa across from him.  “I’m so sorry Helen’s dragged you out here for what will probably turn out to be nothing, but you know how girls can be.”

“Quite,” Sherlock said neutrally.  He favored Helen with a small smile as she reentered the room with a folder in hand.  “John, if you would?”

John took the folder and started flipping through the pages.  Unfortunately, there wasn’t much there.  To hear the coroner tell it, Lydia Roylott was perfectly healthy at the time of her death.  No drugs were present in her system.  No pre-existing medical conditions.  John’s eyebrows drew together in confusion over the fact that a young lady who seemed perfectly healthy had suddenly just dropped dead.  In response to his apparent confusion, Sherlock snatched the folder out of John’s grasp and started rifling through it himself.

“No, we’ll want to go pay this Dr. Ademar a visit,” he said, almost to himself, “These reports aren’t infallible since it’s up to the coroner about what to include as a relevant finding in the final document.”

“You couldn’t do that until tomorrow, Mr. Holmes,” Dr. Roylott interjected, “It’s Sunday, after all.”

“Indeed,” Sherlock responded in a carefully neutral voice.  John had come to realize that Sherlock used that tone when he’d realized that something was amiss, but that he hadn’t quite put his finger on exactly what.

“Helen,” John said, reclaiming the folder so he could actually finish reading it, “When was the last time Lydia saw her Michael?”

“Not since his last leave,” she said shaking her head.  “You don’t think he had anything to do with this, do you?”  

“Not directly,” John placated, “I just wanted to make sure he hadn’t brought home any illness or unusual food she could have been allergic to.”

“You’d be better off looking at that herd of Pikeys who live over at that settlement on River Road,” Dr. Roylott broke in scathingly.  “They’re all probably carrying any manner of things.”

“Well, you’d know,” Sherlock pointed out archly, “You do seem to be the local doctor who treats them the most frequently.”

“And I wish every day it were different,” Dr. Roylott responded with the air of a man under great tribulation.  “They’re exhausting.  They wait too long to seek medical help when they’re ill, once they’re in they never listen to me, and to cap it all, they’re the loudest, most common bunch of layabouts I’ve ever met.”

John tried to conceal an eyeroll at the doctor’s diatribe.  He didn’t treat members of the Traveler community too often, but surely Dr. Roylott was ascribing them too much guilt.  He hadn’t done such a good job of hiding his reaction because Sherlock chose that very moment to catch his eye.  They exchanged a brief smirk over their host’s petty recriminations before Sherlock turned a face of avid concern back to the Roylotts.

“Dr. Roylott, Helen,” Sherlock said getting to his feet, “Thank you for your time, but I believe we’ve got all we need for now.”

John scrambled to his feet, trying to look like he knew their departure had been imminent.  Helen escorted them to the door where she spoke as they bundled back into their outerwear, “I’m sorry to have wasted your time, Mr. Holmes.”

“No, no, don’t be ridiculous,” Sherlock said as he shook her hand.  “This visit has been most enlightening.  Would it be possible to come back tomorrow afternoon?  Once you’re back from school.”

“Certainly.  If you came at around half past six, we could include you for dinner.”  

“Excellent.  We would be delighted.”  Sherlock sounded genuinely pleased for Helen to extend the invitation, which made John laugh since Sherlock only ever ate on a case when he was about to faint from low blood sugar.

“We look forward to it, good afternoon, Miss Roylott.”  Sherlock smiled in farewell before he turned to head back down the drive toward where they’d left their rental car.  

“That doctor’s something else again,” John said with disgust as they walked away from the house.

“You noticed that, did you?”  John could hear the smile in Sherlock’s voice.  

“To go from mutilating fire irons to a model host?  Course I noticed.  I’m not blind.”  They settled themselves into the car, and Sherlock had started the engine before John spoke again, “So, where now?  River Road to see about these Travelers?”

“Yes, John.  They’ll certainly have something to add to this whole sordid business.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has read, left kudos, and commented. I've been so overwhelmed by your kind words and support.


	5. Break it Down

The drive across town to the Traveler settlement took less than thirty minutes, and John used the time to read the coroner’s report again.  If anything, a second reading left John with _more_ questions.

“I just don’t understand,” John said, closing the folder, “She seemed to be perfectly healthy before she died.  What could have happened?”

“What, indeed.”  Sherlock put on his indicator and turned off the road into a small, gated enclave.  They drove through neat rows of carefully maintained caravans and a smattering of more permanent structures until Sherlock pulled up at the only brick and mortar house John had seen since they’d entered the site.  He strode up to the front door and rang the bell, looking around at the homes that made up this little community.  John could practically see the wheels turning behind Sherlock’s changeable eyes.

“Can I help you?” A woman in a jogging suit had finally opened the door to them.  She didn’t seem exactly pleased to see mid-Sunday afternoon company standing on her doorstep.

Sherlock put on his most winning smile, “Yes, I was hoping to speak to either you or your husband about the issues your community has been having with Dr. Emerson Roylott.”

Their hostess’s face closed off even more, “I don’t know anything about any conflicts.  I can ask my Robbie, but I’m sure he’ll tell you the same.”  Even though she had extended the offer to help them, she didn’t make a move to either go ask “her Robbie” or to invite them in to wait. 

“I need to make a quick call, so we can just wait here while you go ask,” Sherlock offered, whipping his phone out of his coat pocket to lend credence to his words.  The woman who had answered the door nodded and disappeared back into the house to presumably fetch her husband.

“That was welcoming,” John said with an eyeroll.

“John,” Sherlock scolded, “Did you really think that a society that’s been marginalized for generations would immediately take me into their confidence?  I hardly come across as the sympathetic agony aunt.”

“Robbie says he hasn’t heard any word against Dr. Roylott.”  Their hostess had returned quite quickly, and in no better mood.  “He’ll see us when most others won’t bother to give the time of day.  I don’t know where you think you heard tell that we don’t like him, but it’s a lie.  Now, did you want something else?”  Her brusque tone implied what their answer _should_ be. 

“Not at all.”  Sherlock’s smile was just as fixed as when they’d first come to the door.  “Clearly my information was incorrect.  Thank you.”  John nodded in silent farewell before turning to follow Sherlock back to their rental.

“You said you found negative feedback about Dr. Roylott from people claiming to be Travelers on the Internet,” John said once they were back on the main road headed for town.  His irritation at the woman’s easy dismissal took on an additional depth from all of the frustration in his own life of late.  “Why wouldn’t she either tell us what she knows or at least point us to who would?”  

Sherlock took a moment to consider before he opened his mouth, “Remember, this is a group who lives on the fringes of a modern society.  As accepting as the twenty-first century claims to be, there is still a large segment of the population who looks at Travelers with intense suspicion.  You saw that Dr. Roylott had no trouble insulting them.  Considering that, how easy do you think it is for them to access services?”

“I guess it wouldn’t be as simple as finding a new clinic, then,” John conceded.  With nothing else to say and all of their tangible leads exhausted, they subsided into silence for the rest of the drive to the inn Helen had suggested.  John leaned his head against the cool glass and looked out the window at the brown, bare trees flashing past the window.  The skeletal branches echoed his emotional state.  Withered.  Used.  Bled dry.  He was so tired of feeling every dip and crash as he and Mary trundled toward the creeping inevitability of the end of their marriage.  After everything that had happened, he could understand why Sherlock thought caring was not an advantage.

 

~~*~~

 

The place Sherlock had booked them into reminded John a little bit of The Crossed Keys when he stepped through to check them in.  

“Is it just the two nights then?”  At John’s nod, the receptionist smiled and continued typing their information into her computer.  “There you are.  One of you will be in 16 and the other will be in 18.”  She turned to the key rack behind her and pulled off two separate room keys which she handed across the desk with another warm smile.  John blinked at the keys, confused and slightly irritated.  Surely Sherlock would have an explanation for why they were wasting the money on two separate rooms when it had never been a problem for them to share a room on out of town cases before.  He clenched the keys in his hand and turned briskly from the desk to see what this nonsense was all about.

“Sherlock,” John called, striding back out to the car to try to sort this out, ideally without turning it into some sort of public row in the car park, “Why did you book two separate rooms?”

Sherlock turned from where he had been standing by the car smoking and contemplating the lawn stripped brown and bare under the winter frost.  “Yes?”  John jingled the keys in his face in lieu of repeating his earlier question.  “Ah, the rooms.  I thought you would prefer your privacy.  What with the whole espionage situation.”  He threw down his cigarette and went to pop the trunk and retrieve his bag.  John stared at Sherlock’s uncommunicative back for a moment before he sighed and grabbed his own bag and followed Sherlock into the inn and up to their rooms.  In the hall outside their rooms, Sherlock plucked one of the keys gently out of John’s hand and disappeared behind the door, letting it shut softly behind him.  John stood in the hall and blinked after his friend, once again at a loss about his distant behaviour.

After John let the door to his own room close, he leaned back against it and let his eyes fall shut.  He took a couple of deep breaths to try to restore some semblance of equilibrium to his swirling thoughts.  He didn’t understand how Sherlock could alternate so quickly between the easy camaraderie of their early friendship and the stiff distance that seemed to have become a permanent fixture between them since Sherlock’s return.  Speaking for himself, he knew he wanted the closeness of their prior friendship back.  He sometimes thought that he might want other things he was afraid to admit, occasionally even to himself.  But if he couldn’t even say what he wanted in the privacy of his own mind, how in the hell could he expect Sherlock to take him seriously if he were to somehow find the courage to give voice to these feelings?  He couldn’t.  John pounded his head against the unforgiving wood of the door a few times, just to emphasize his own impotent self-loathing.

Recognizing that standing against the door having a sulk would get him absolutely nowhere, he took his toiletries out of the top of his duffel and put them in the bathroom, then threw the rest of his bag on the bed.  After a moment’s hesitation, he dug his phone out of his pocket.  Since it was still too early to try to coax some food into Sherlock and he wasn’t settled enough to keep reading his book or watch telly, John decided he might as well see what Mycroft wanted.  It wouldn’t do to be ungrateful and ignore Mycroft’s updates since the people he’d been in contact with so far had been so helpful and discreet, he thought, as he punched in his voicemail passcode.  

“Hey, John, um, it’s me--Mary.”  John nearly dropped his phone in shock.  He couldn’t imagine how she’d gotten hold of a phone, much less what she could possibly think she could have to say that he would want to hear.  “Look, I don’t know what anyone’s told you since Friday, but I was hoping we could talk; maybe I could explain myself.  Make you understand.  I know things between us have been hard for a while, but I miss you.  I think Little Bit misses you too; she’s much more active when I talk to her about you.  I just want us to go back to the way things were.  To get back to the way we were before.”  She let a small, rueful laugh slip out before she continued, “Anyway, I’m not sure how much longer I’ll be in the country, and MI6 can’t guarantee the Americans will be as accommodating about things like phone calls once they hand me over.  Please, would you call me back?  I think I’m going a bit mad without the sound of your voice.  I miss you, love.  Call me?  Please?”  

After the line went dead, John stared at his phone in disbelief for a split second, and then he saw red.  John’s hands clenched reflexively into fists, but the pop of where plastic met glass reminded him of the cell phone still gripped tightly in his hand.  He relaxed his fingers around it, but urge to smash, to destroy something, only surged higher.  He hurled the phone at the far wall, not caring in the slightest if it survived the trip this time.  

John stalked into the bathroom, pushing the door open so hard that it ricocheted back off the counter.  He ran his hands roughly through his hair, knowing he needed to get himself under control.  It wouldn’t do for them to get tossed out of the hotel on their arses all because John couldn’t muster a little self restraint.  He grabbed one of the heavy glasses that stood on the edge of the sink.  A deep breath and a cool drink of water from the tap did little to calm his racing heart or his frenetic thoughts.

Standing in the bathroom under the unflinching glare of the fluorescent lights, the hideous absurdity of his predicament hit him all over again.  In a renewed burst of rage, John threw the half-full glass at the far corner of the bathroom, taking prurient delight in the sharp crash and muted splash as the glass broke against the hard floor and the remaining fluid flowed across the tile.  He snatched a second glass off the counter, smiling grimly when the new smash of the delicate glass against the unforgiving tile sent up a cascade of razor-sharp shards.  John was reaching for the third glass when a soft knock sounded at the room’s door.  He ignored the summons in favour of picking up the last glass and hurling it with savage intensity against the far wall.  One of the slivers flew back and hit John in the face, but a second, more insistent knock at the door pulled his attention away from his destructive tantrum.  He looked around the tiny bathroom littered with the debris of his outburst, and tried to bring his temper back under control.

“What?” John shouted, slamming the bathroom door behind him to hide the mess.  He yanked the room door open to come face-to-face with Sherlock standing calmly on the other side.  John wasn’t sure he could stomach Sherlock either callously deducing his state of mind as if it was just another puzzle or, possibly worse, shamming that he cared that John was hurting.

“I--I heard a commotion and wanted to make sure you were alright.”  Sherlock examined John’s face minutely before he reached out tentatively towards John’s face, “John, you’re bleeding--”

“I’m _fine_ ,” John retorted, swatting at Sherlock’s hand.  Sherlock immediately drew his hand back, clearly abashed for having invaded his friend’s space.  John instantly felt guilty for rejecting Sherlock so quickly.  He was only trying to help, after all.  “It’s not you.  It’s this whole _bloody_ mess with Mary, or Margaret, or whoever the hell she is.  I don’t even know what to think anymore.”

Sherlock blinked as he processed this new information.  The emotional turmoil of the whole situation meant that John knew it was a bit beyond Sherlock’s skill set, but he couldn’t help poking the wound when he asked, “How much of this did you know and not tell me?”    

“John, please let me get something for your face,” Sherlock insisted instead of an actual response, but before John could answer, he turned and vanished back into the adjoining room he was occupying.  Alone in the deafening silence once again, John scowled and turned to face the rest of his room.  His bag still lay undisturbed on the bed and his phone lay beyond that on the floor.  John sighed in resignation and went to pick his phone up for the second time in as many days.  Still miraculously uncracked he noted with surprise, as he slapped it down on the bedside table.  He turned back to his bag; it was only now early evening, so he could stand to unpack to try to get himself calmed down.

“John?  May I come in?”  Sherlock’s tentative voice made John bristle all over again.  Since when was Sherlock hesitant about anything?  He could suck up the attention of an entire room with one carefully placed deduction or dramatic gesture, so why was he tiptoeing around like he and John were strangers?

“Yes, fine.  What is it, Sherlock?”  John hated the impatience in his voice, but for the moment it still felt so _good_ to let his anger bleed through.   

“I wanted to make sure you were alright.  You cut yourself quite badly.”  Sherlock held up a bottle of Dettol and a wad of cotton wool he’d apparently retrieved when he’d gone back to his room.

“No, it just looks bad,” John said dismissively as he moved to put his clothes in the dresser drawer.  “Face wounds always bleed more and look worse than they really are.”  He turned back to his bag, but the only thing left for him to unpack was his bathrobe, and he was in absolutely no mood to revisit the mess in the bathroom.  Instead, he turned and snatched the Dettol and the wool out of Sherlock’s hands.  “I’ll take care of it.”

Sherlock nodded, “I’ll leave you to it, then.”  John heard him leave the room, shutting the door quietly behind him.  He turned to the mirror above the dresser to sort out his face, and just as he suspected, it looked much worse than it actually was.  He daubed up all the blood with the Dettol, but since the cut was neither deep nor long, he didn’t bother with a plaster.  John sighed and set the bottle down on the dresser.  He shouldn’t have taken his resentment out on Sherlock when his friend was only trying to help.  He knew, with the sickening clarity that had accompanied quite a few of his revelations recently, that he had been taking advantage of Sherlock’s kindness.

John picked up the phone in his room, knowing as he dialed, that he needed to stop acting like such a child.  “Um, yes, hello,” John said when the woman from the front desk picked up.  “I’m afraid I’ve had a bit of an accident with some broken glass in my room.  Would it be possible for someone from housekeeping to come sweep up the bathroom?”  John smiled at the receptionist’s unflappable calm and her assurance that his bathroom would be useable again in about thirty minutes.  He thanked her and rung off.  Now, to clean up the other half of his mess.

John’s nerves twisted his stomach and shortened his breath as he stood outside the door to Sherlock’s room.  In theory, he knew what he wanted to say, but had no idea how to go about expressing himself.  He grimaced; this shouldn’t be so difficult.  Clenching his fingers reflexively, John steeled himself and knocked. 

“John?”  Sherlock had taken off his jacket and rolled his shirtsleeves up in the time since he’d left John’s room.  John thought he looked more approachable standing in the doorway in just black trousers and a shirt the same blue as a winter sky.  Somehow, he’d slipped free of some of the armour he normally used to secure himself against the rest of the world.   

“I just came to give you this back,” John brandished the bottle of Dettol between them.  Sherlock’s gaze raked over him before he reached out to take the disinfectant spray. 

“What could Mycroft possibly have had to say that left you in such a state?”  Sherlock asked, stepping back and holding the door open to let John come through.  John strode into Sherlock’s room, but quickly turned back to face him.

“It wasn’t _Mycroft_ who called,” John retorted, feeling his prior anger struggling to break loose again.  “It was _Mary_ , and do you know what she wanted?  She wanted me to call her to _talk_.  Says she misses me and wants us to go back to the way things _were_.”  John paced across the open space in Sherlock’s room.  “What the _hell_ am I even supposed to say to that?”

“What do you want to say?”  Sherlock asked bluntly.

“I--what?”  John whirled back to face Sherlock, who was leaning idly against the desk staring intently at him, “It’s not that simple, Sherlock.”

“Of course it is.  Why wouldn’t it be?”  Sherlock sounded so certain; John envied him his ability to disregard _social norms_ and simply do what he thought was best.  

“God, I want it to be that easy.  I’m just so _tired_ of all of this.  All the lies and manipulation; my life is one deception after another.”  When he reached the end of his rant, John’s last bit of fight went out of him, and he slumped against the desk next to Sherlock.  “Why does this always happen to me?”

Sherlock flinched away at the repetition of that question from so many nights ago, but recovered himself quickly, “I told you everything I know about that already.”  Sherlock’s voice was edged with the same resignation John heard in his own, but before John could formulate a reply, he continued, “Please know John, if I have ever deceived you about myself, it has always been with the goal of keeping you safe.  You know I find it difficult to say these things, but John Watson, you are my best friend.”

Then Sherlock did the last thing John would have expected from him; he reached out and put his arm gently around John’s shoulder.  John hesitated a moment, but the contact was so comforting and sustaining, he let his head come to rest against Sherlock’s shoulder.  John smiled when Sherlock’s thumb began tracing gentle circles against his upper arm.  As he felt the last vestiges of his anger over his wife’s voicemail dissipate, John let his arm come to rest around Sherlock’s waist.  Standing in the deepening twilight, John silently acknowledged that he didn’t have to be the peacemaker this time.  

“Sherlock?”  John felt the question bubble up before he could stop it, “What if I don’t want to take her back?”  He turned to look at Sherlock’s profile to try to gauge his reaction.  Between the gathering dusk and his angle leaning against Sherlock’s shoulder, John could see the corner of his mouth pull down into a thoughtful frown, but couldn’t read much beyond that.

“It shouldn’t matter what I, or anybody else, thinks.  Only you know your own mind.”

John hummed in agreement at Sherlock’s succinct evaluation of the situation.  He was right.  John didn’t need to do anything to try to please anyone but himself.  However, John also recognized that understanding that fact was miles away from actually following through with it, and he knew he would need a bit of time to adjust to the whole idea before he could suit actions to words.  For now, this was enough; just being here with Sherlock, doing what came so naturally to them.  There would be time enough for all the rest later.    

“John?”  Sherlock’s gentle prod made him set his train of thought aside and return to the present, “We should eat before it gets too late.  I want to get to the morgue first thing in the morning.” 

“I’ll go get cleaned up,” John said as he nodded and straightened, pulling himself back into the guise of the self-possessed soldier, but if he let his hand linger a moment longer before he pulled away, he hoped Sherlock wouldn’t mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've edited the chapter counter to show 11 chapters because I've now got a rough outline for the entire rest of the story! Updates should continue on an every two weeks schedule.


	6. Who You Are and What You Need

John went back to his room to get cleaned up for dinner, but once he was alone, he couldn’t bear the idea of having to go back out and be sociable, even if dinner was only the two of them.  He dithered for a moment about how to break it to Sherlock that he’d rather just stay in his room, but finally settled on honesty being the easiest solution.   _Suck it up, Watson, it’s not such a big deal_ , he mentally scolded himself before squaring his shoulders and marching back to Sherlock’s room to tell him that he just wasn’t up for dinner.

Standing in front of Sherlock’s door for the second time that evening, he raised his hand to knock, but stopped at the sound of Sherlock’s voice raised in anger coming from inside the room.  “I don’t care what you thought you’d get, it wasn’t worth the risk.”  John could practically picture Sherlock pacing back and forth across the room in his agitation.  “No, in spite of what you _thought_ , this wasn’t your decision to make.  Do you remember what your last gamble cost us?”  Another pause as Sherlock listened to whoever was on the other end of the call, “Clearly not, or you wouldn’t have made the same mistake a second time.  You _claim_ to be the smart one, Mycroft, but after this, I’m not so certain.”  A heavy silence fell inside the room, so John took the opportunity to knock sharply on Sherlock’s door, hoping he had hung up and wasn’t just listening to Mycroft’s latest response.  Sherlock’s footsteps approached the door, and he quickly pulled it open, “John.  Are you ready to eat?”

“Sherlock, um, I’m not really up for dinner tonight.”  John’s tone was apologetic.  He didn’t want Sherlock to think he was already abandoning him when they’d only just started to reconnect.  “I think I’m just going to order in.  I need to call Mycroft anyway.”  

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed as he scrutinized John’s face, “You needn’t placate me.  I know you’re having to make decisions that fly in the face of your naturally socially conscious nature, but please believe me when I tell you: this is not a situation that demands a peacemaker.  I’m not hungry anyway, so feel free to eat or not as it pleases you.  I’ll be here working.”

John nodded mutely, unsure why he had even bothered trying to lie to Sherlock. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”  He blinked quickly trying to keep the prickling at the back of his eyes just that.  “I’ve got to, um, well.”  He trailed into silence and gestured vaguely back in the direction of his room and backed away, turning only after Sherlock nodded and shut his door leaving him alone in the hallway once again.

Back in his room, he flipped through the guest services book before finally deciding he might be a bit too worked up to make food a wise choice.  He closed the book and flopped back on the bed with a sigh.  Time to get this over with, then.

“John,” Mycroft sounded especially unctuous this evening, although that could have just as easily been John projecting.  “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

John rolled his eyes.  Surely Mycroft knew why he was calling.  “Why did you let Mary call me?”

“I was under the impression that married couples find communication during a forced separation bolstering to their morale.  Was I mistaken?”  Mycroft’s voice oozing across the connection was more than John could handle.

“Oh, Jesus Christ, Mycroft.  What did you _want_?”  John’s last remaining shred of patience evaporated, and he slammed his fist against the duvet.  “I _know_ you let Mary call me and I _know_ you want something out of her or me or both of us, so come on, out with it.”

A beat of silence was the only indication that Mycroft had been caught out.  “Some of my colleagues had hoped that Ms. Moran would be willing to be more forthright about her activities and associates with you given your shared history.”

“Forthright?”  John’s voice rose in incredulity, “You do realize she’s lied to me from the moment we met, right?  That she’s apparently even been lying to me about things that directly concern me?  Why in the hell would she start being honest with me now?”

“To be fair, Ms. Moran does currently find herself with significantly limited options compared to when she was at liberty.  The implication was made that if she could find a way to make herself more valuable to Her Majesty’s government than the reward for turning her over to the Americans would be, certain, arrangements, could be reached.”  Mycroft, ever the diplomat, pushed his agenda forward with a subtlety that would have made Machiavelli proud.

“Then you’ll just have to reach them without me.  I’m well shot of this whole business, Mycroft.  I’ve got nothing left to give.  Bloody hell, our baby isn’t even _our_ baby.  It’s _her_ baby.”  John let his exhaustion and frustration lend his words an air finality.

“Am I to understand you wish to terminate your association with Ms. Moran?”  Mycroft kept his voice carefully neutral, but John wasn’t fooled.  He knew that Mycroft would want him to hold onto Mary’s trust a little longer so he could exploit the connection for whatever he, or she for that matter, could possibly gain, but he couldn’t do that.  Sherlock’s advice from before rose up in front of him, and the offer was too tempting to back down.

“Yes.  I’m finished.  I don’t want her to contact me, or for anyone to contact me on her behalf, come to that.  Can you do that for me, Mycroft?”  

“I shall endeavour to make that happen.”  John did not overlook the fact that ‘endeavour’ did not mean the same thing as ‘guarantee.’

“Do you need anything from me to, um, make this official?”  Now that he’d made up his mind, John wanted finalize all of the technicalities before he could become swamped by the enormity of his decision.

“No, no.  You’ve been most accommodating.”  Mycroft’s patronizing tone slithered across John’s consciousness like so much oily sludge.  

“Is there anything else, then?”  John’s tone dared Mycroft to raise another issue.  “I’ve had a long day, and we’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

“Then I’ll say goodnight for now.  I’ll email you the final documents within the next eight hours.  You will, of course, be able to sign them electronically at your convenience.”  Mycroft rang off, sounding slightly chastened for his earlier lack of tact.  The novelty of Mycroft even tacitly acknowledging he was in the wrong flashed across John’s consciousness as he hung up.

Finished with the part of his day that demanded he wear presentable clothes, John headed for the bathroom, shedding jeans, shirt, pants, and socks as he went.  Today, John decided, merited a luxurious soak rather than an efficient scrub, so he ran a bath just the right side of scalding, hit shuffle on the Relaxation playlist Ella had insisted would be an excellent self-help tool, and submerged himself in the hot water all the way up to his chin.  

John leaned his head back against the edge of the tub and closed his eyes.  He let his arms hang suspended in the water and let the heat begin to seep under his skin and unwind the stiff tendrils of tension that gripped his muscles.  Drifting in the water with the music on low, John let Sherlock’s words from earlier float behind his closed eyelids.  

> _It shouldn’t matter what I, or anybody else, thinks.  Only you know your own mind._

That was the trouble, though.  John couldn’t remember a time in his life when he didn’t care what someone else thought.  

He’d spent his youth trying to convince coaches there was more to him than his height and teachers there was more to him than rugby.  He remembered his lab partner in his A-level chemistry class had taken one look and him and told the teacher he’d rather work alone than with someone who was so clearly in the class to make up the numbers.  The teacher’s indulgent eye roll and willingness to reshuffle the pairings left John feeling exposed and worthless.  He had run conditioning drills on the rugby pitch until he’d thrown up that afternoon and then doubled the amount of time he’d spent on his chemistry work the rest of the year because he was so angry a boy he’d barely spoken to before thought he was nothing more than an empty shell playing at knowing things.

The special recognition for both chemistry and rugby that year had thrilled his parents, his coaches, and his teachers, and John blossomed under the praise.  After that, he became an expert at meeting everyone’s expectations while making sure he didn’t disappoint anyone in the process.

He’d spent his time at uni trying to convince his parents that no matter what Harry did, he was someone they could be proud to call their son.  He studied assiduously enough to end up in the top decile of his MBBS class, worked hard enough to never have to ask his parents for money, and kept tabs on Harry closely enough to keep her on a reasonably stable course and out of their parents’ line of fire.  There were some things even John couldn’t control.

His stellar streak with chemistry lab partners continued in his first year at university when Nikhil, call me Nick, no really, it’s fine, had dropped onto the stool across from him and let his smile light up his whole face.  John had been so flustered by their shy flirtation all through that first class that he’d left his bag in the lab and hadn’t had the presence of mind to notice until almost nine that night.  

Cautious flirtation had evolved into stolen kisses over books and lab reports in the library and rambling walks spent holding hands and leaning into each other to laugh over shared jokes and stories of their misspent youths.  Innocent kisses eventually became breathless snogging on the sofa in John’s flat and heated groping in Nick’s bed in the house he shared with three other students.  The first thing John had ever stood up and taken for himself made him happier than getting into med school.  

Good things never lasted, at least, they did not last for John Watson.  When Nick idly mentioned visiting John at home during their first Christmas holiday, the initial cracks appeared.  John’s terror over how his parents would react to him bringing home a man stopped his voice and he couldn’t even give Nick a decent excuse.  He’d finally stammered something vague about going to visit his dad’s side of the family who still lived in Scotland, and Nick, thankfully, had just nodded.  He'd just nodded every other time John put him off, but a defeated look began to creep into his eyes.  When he’d started mentioning going into the army, the defeat migrated into Nick’s tone.  

It turned out, John wasn’t quite as good at meeting everyone’s expectations as he thought.  Nick’s patience wore through the night before the Easter holidays in their second year when John tried, for what felt like the hundredth time, to explain why going into the army was so important.  Being able to live up to his father’s assumption that he would follow his grandfather’s legacy and join the military all while keeping Nick happy turned out to be too much.  The end, when it came, was all the more painful for Nick’s sympathetic understanding.  He told John that while he appreciated the logic behind his choices, he couldn’t stand to be John’s second-rate secret for the rest of their lives.  

John understood.  Of course he did.  After telling his parents he needed to spend the holiday studying and telling his friends he needed to help Harry dry out, again, he holed himself up in his room over that Easter holiday and did nothing except lay on the sofa and watch every Bond movie he owned while eating a truly horrific quantity of junk food.  John, the brave soldier even then, emerged from the break as if nothing had changed; except, of course, it had.  He spent every waking moment either studying, working, or preparing for life as an army medic.  His parents couldn’t have been more proud with his career.  His professors couldn’t have been more impressed with his marks.  John couldn’t have been more lonely.

That was what this all boiled down to, really, John thought as he shook himself out of his memories and stood up out of the now-tepid bath water; he always gave his absolute all to whatever he faced.  He always insisted it was simply a matter of doing his best, and, in a way, it was.  He was proud to be the best student, the best medic, the best of everything, but the trouble with that, John realized, was that didn’t leave him with anything for himself.  

He finished his evening routine and collapsed into bed, but once he was there, sleep eluded him.  He readjusted his pillow and curled himself tighter into the duvet, sighing quietly.  Spending the evening thinking about how he’d made it to this point hadn’t been exactly pleasant, but it had been beneficial.  Sherlock had been right.  He needed to make his decisions based more on what he wanted, not what he thought people wanted him to want or, worse, what he thought people expected him to want.  Settling further under the blankets, John’s acceptance of Sherlock’s groundbreaking idea that it was more than allowable to want things and to take things for himself finally succeeded in dragging him down into a deep and dreamless sleep.

 

~~*~~

 

John jolted awake in the grey light of early morning to a crash that sounded like it had come from Sherlock’s room.  He tugged his bathrobe on over his pyjamas and padded out into the hallway on bare feet.  Outside Sherlock’s door, he had just raised his hand to tap quietly, but the thump of something hitting the floor followed by a muffled “goddamnit” stayed his hand.  Sherlock, the paragon of poise, considered the kind of outburst clearly issuing from his room the height of imbecilic behaviour, so John beat a hasty retreat back to his own room.  

Back in the relative safety of his bed, John stewed in confusion.  On the one hand, he was fairly certain Sherlock could probably use some kind of assistance, but on the other, he had no idea what kind of help to offer or even if it would be well received.  He clicked on his phone’s lock screen to check the time.  Half past five was too early for most reasonable people to have woken naturally, but John typed and sent before he could think better of it:

_I can’t sleep.  You awake yet?_

He didn’t honestly expect a response; he assumed Sherlock would withdraw into himself until he’d sorted whatever it was that had him banging around his room and swearing at such an ungodly early hour.  He could hardly believe it when his phone pinged barely two minutes later:

_Research for Miss Roylott.  I could use a second opinion if you’re not too busy.  SH_

John took that as an invitation, but he didn’t immediately cross back to see what was happening.  He took a few minutes to brush his teeth, comb his hair into some semblance of its usual order, and pull a pair of socks on to ward off the early morning cold on his feet. Once he’d made himself as presentable as was possible for an impromptu pre-dawn case meeting, he made his way back to Sherlock’s room.  The door had been propped open with the security latch, so John simply scooted quietly into the room.  He found Sherlock pacing frenetically in front of his bed and tugging sharply at his hair.

“No, shut up,” he muttered, giving his hair another vicious yank.  He reached the far side of the room and spun back toward the door, eyes still on the floor.  John stood in the entryway of the room watching the manic display, silent and unsure.  Sherlock strode back towards John, but when he reached the near side of the room, he didn’t move into the narrow hallway where John stood.  Instead he turned back again, hands still tangled in his hair, an intermittent thread of muttered monologue still coming from his mouth.  He hadn’t even noticed John standing right in front of him.

The last thing John wanted was to startle Sherlock when he was clearly out of touch with his surroundings, so he got his attention the next best way.  Feeling a right fool for texting a man standing, well, pacing, in the same room, John pulled out his phone and, dredging up a memory from what felt like another lifetime, tapped:

_Well?  You asked me to come.  I’m assuming it’s important._

Sherlock’s phone pinged softly where it was lying on the bed, and he jumped slightly at the noise then turned to snatch it off the duvet.  His eyes flitted across the screen as he read John’s message, and when he looked to the door, a smile lit his face when he caught John’s eye.

“I didn’t want to interrupt,” John admitted somewhat sheepishly as he stepped all the way into the room.  “You seemed like you were pretty wrapped up in whatever it was you were thinking about.”

“Oh, that?  Nothing that couldn’t wait.”  Sherlock waved a dismissive hand next to his head.  He moved over to one of the armchairs and settled himself, pulling his dressing gown up to swaddle his drawn up knees and cover his bare toes.  John watched Sherlock watch his silk-covered toes for a few seconds before he gave up any pretense of civility and flopped down across the foot of Sherlock’s unused bed to at least stare in relative comfort.

“I meant to ask you something last night but forgot,” John blurted into the silence.  Sherlock’s head popped up, and he regarded John warily.  “Why are we going to the Roylotts’ for dinner tonight?  You didn’t used to eat on cases, you know, before.”

“Yes, well, I’m beginning to suspect that uncovering the cause of poor Lydia’s death may be best served by affecting normalcy.”  The bitterness that edged Sherlock’s smile when John had mentioned 'before' did not escape John’s notice.  “Besides, I would think you’d be pleased that I’m finally following your advice and ‘eating like a normal human for once.’”

“That’s never stopped you before,” John said with a smile, rolling over onto his back and letting the comfort of the bed and Sherlock’s answering hum of acknowledgement begin to soothe his rattled nerves.  John asked his next question without thinking, “What were you doing in here before?  It sounded like you were wrestling a bear.”

“Oh, nothing important.  Simply testing how long it would take someone to get out of a locked and bolted room without being able to see clearly.”  Sherlock’s carefully neutral voice was obviously meant to deflect concern, but all it did was draw John’s attention.  He looked over at Sherlock who had suddenly developed an inordinate fascination with the edge of the desk.

John rolled back up onto his side; he didn’t think Sherlock was being wholly honest with him, but he could play along, “Why?”

“I don’t believe Lydia Roylott was supposed to make it out of her room.  I think whoever meant her harm hoped she would succumb to whatever killed her quietly in her sleep rather than loudly in the hall.”

“So you do think something happened?  You think this was murder?”  John propped his head up on his hand to better look at Sherlock while he spoke.

“I’m fairly positive this wasn’t a run-of-the-mill death.  Have you ever seen someone have an allergic reaction, John?”

“Yeah.  One of the neighbour kids was allergic to wasps, and he got stung one summer.  Anaphylaxis is a hell of a thing to see when you’re eight.  I think his respiration failed within five minutes.  He lived, thank God, but he wasn’t really the same after that; he went too long without oxygen to his brain, probably.  Is that what you think this was?  Anaphylactic shock?”

“Mmm, not enough information yet, but I do think it’s peculiar that a young, healthy adult wouldn’t exhibit any symptoms of distress and then deteriorate so acutely.  I’m quite interested to see the raw data that Dr. Ademar used to compose his report.”  Sherlock glanced at his watch lying on the desk, “I’m going to get ready so we can meet him early.  You’re welcome to stay if you like.”

John nodded as Sherlock stood stiffly from his seat.  He massaged his lower back, rolled his shoulders, and flexed both his wrists before stepping away from the chair and towards the bathroom.  John watched him go, wondering when his friend had taken on so many mannerisms he would usually associate with patients who suffered from chronic pain.  Once the bathroom door shut, John let his head fall down onto the duvet and he drew his knees up to curl up in the early morning hush.  The muted splash of the water in the shower, the softness of the duvet, and the warmth from the heater all combined to lull John's mind about Sherlock, the case, and his personal life, and he slipped into a comfortable doze.

John next woke to the sound of Sherlock speaking softly to someone at the door.  He rolled over, realizing with a flush of embarrassment that he’d fallen asleep on Sherlock’s bed and that Sherlock had pulled the duvet over him while he’d been sleeping.  Sherlock, apparently finished with the person at the door, made his way back into the room carrying a tray laden with what smelled like breakfast.  John sat up and dragged his fingers through his hair, determined to stay awake for the day this time.

“Please tell me you got coffee,” he begged from the middle of his nest on the bed.

“Of course I did.  I have met you before, John.”  Sherlock set the tray down and moved aside to let John get his caffeine fix.  Once he resettled on the bed with coffee and a scone, he looked Sherlock over from top to toe, trying to figure out what he’d done to himself now that had left him moving with such stiffness earlier.  He seemed to be moving more naturally, but John made a mental note to keep an eye on Sherlock for more signs of lingering injury.  It wouldn’t do to have him incapacitated if this case required any physical exertion.   

“I’ve called ahead and arranged a meeting with Dr. Ademar for nine,” Sherlock said over the rim of his own coffee mug.  John blinked, embarrassed Sherlock had caught him staring.

“Okay.”  John polished off his food and took another swig of his coffee.

Sherlock stared down into his cup, momentarily lost in thought.  “I am quite convinced there’s more to Dr. Roylott’s doting stepfather routine he’s been putting on for us.”

“Of course there is,” John replied.  “You saw what a cock he was when he came round ours day before yesterday.”

“Behaviour aside,” Sherlock said, shaking his head dismissively.  “When can you be ready?”

“Thirty minutes should do it,” John answered.  He rose and set his empty mug on the tray.  “I’ll meet you in the lobby?”  At Sherlock’s nod, he departed for his room to get ready for the day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your supportive comments, enthusiastic kudos, and for sticking with me on this journey. I hope you're having as much fun as I am.


	7. Once Bitten...

Showered, shaved, and dressed, John scowled at his watch as he made his way downstairs.  He’d taken closer to 45 minutes to get ready, so now he was rushing since Sherlock was probably about to go mad waiting for him.

John reached the bottom of the stairs, but he had to look around the lobby a moment before he spotted his friend.  Sherlock stood by one of the windows that looked out onto the front lawn and he was dressed, as usual, in one of his pristine, perfectly fitted suits, his coat and scarf draped over his arm while he waited.  John stood at the bottom of the stairs for a moment, letting himself watch without being seen.  Sherlock’s position by the window allowed the early sunlight to bathe his face and illuminate the red that hid in the depths of his inky hair.  He readjusted his posture as he waited, his shoulders shifting slightly under his jacket and shirt until he stood just that little bit straighter.  That little bit more ready to face the world.  John sighed.  Why, he wondered, hadn’t he had the courage to pursue Sherlock when their lives had been so much simpler.  Oh, right, he’d been too busy trying to keep up appearances.  Nothing for it now, he supposed.  He’d missed his chance, so now their friendship would have to be enough.  

John pulled his jacket on as he marched across the lobby, wanting to present the most composed front he could.  “All set, then?” he asked, pleased his voice didn’t give rise to his inner turmoil.  Sherlock jumped and whipped his head around at the sound of his voice.

“Oh, John.  Yes.  Ready when you are.”  He unfolded his coat and tugged it on before turning towards the door.  He strode out in the direction of their rental, leaving John to fall in step behind him.

The drive to the coroner’s office was mercifully quiet.  John manned the map, thankful that the task of navigation was enough to keep his mind reasonably focused on something other than the endless loop of might-have-been he’d been stuck in since a memory stick had flipped his life upside down and given him a second glimpse at everything he was sure he’d lost.

The coroner’s office was tucked away in a back hallway of one of the faceless office parks that had dominated construction in the latter half of the 80’s.  The coroner himself didn’t stand out any more.  He was the kind of person who made John uneasy right from the start.  His eyes never seemed to settle, instead they were constantly darting about.  

“Mr. Holmes, Mr. Watson, what can I do for you?”  Dr. Richard Ademar asked in a reedy voice, as he looked up from the papers strewn across his desk.

“As I said on the phone earlier, _Doctor_ Watson and I have been asked to look into the death of Miss Lydia Roylott.”  Sherlock stepped further into the room as he spoke, but he did not remove his coat or even offer his hand by way of greeting.  John grimaced.  It was going to be one of those kinds of meetings.

“Doctor?”  Ademar fumbled the papers he’d been reshuffling and glanced suspiciously over at John.  “Right, yes.  I suppose a doctor would be good for these kinds of things.  Can I offer you gentlemen something to drink?  Tea?  Coffee?  We’ve just put a fresh pot on.”

Sherlock scowled, “No, I’d much rather read your original findings, compare them to the report you provided at the inquest, and leave you to the rest of your current caseload.”

The paper shuffling stopped.  Ademar stared at his hands braced against the top of the desk.  “Of course.  I...she...that was such a tragedy.  We’re friends, you know.  Emerson and I.  Since med school.  Broke his heart when she passed.”  He glanced up at Sherlock, “I can certainly let you look.  Can’t take it out of the office, mind, but you’re welcome to use the interview room across the hall.”

Sherlock’s thin smile was his only sign that Dr. Ademar was moving in the right direction.  He nodded tightly and turned to the filing cabinet, “Now she passed in August, if I remember correctly.”  He pulled open a drawer and thirty seconds worth of digging netted him a folder with Lydia Roylott and her case number typed neatly on the tab.  “Here it is.  Not much beyond what I ended up including in the final report, but you can certainly look.”

Sherlock took the folder Ademar held out to him and turned back towards the door, leafing through the contents.

“Thank you,” John said, nodding to Dr. Ademar before he turned to follow Sherlock.  He hurried after Sherlock into the conference room their host had pointed out to them. 

In the room across the hall, Sherlock had already started spreading out the photographs and printouts from the file.  He finished scattering the folder’s contents across the table and stepped back to take it all in.  John surveyed the spread of documents before snatching a toxicology report from the middle of the mess to begin reading.

“This, here, this wasn’t in the report Helen showed us,” John said, pointing to a line on the original he’d picked up.  “There’s some protein breakdown and enzyme reactions here that are definitely unusual.”

Sherlock stepped closer to peer over his shoulder at the printout.  “Unusual how?”

John blinked, trying to cajole his brain into dredging up the memory he wanted.  “It--”  He blinked again, and this time the incident came back to him, “It looks similar to the results I saw for a bloke I had to treat in Afghanistan during my second deployment.  One of our Wolfhound drivers came into hospital said he’d gotten bit by something while he was helping one of the motor pool boys work on his vehicle.   He didn’t see what it was but his hand was swelling something awful and his fingers were turning black around the nails, so I did a blood draw, and it came back with similar results to these.”

“Did you ever figure out what it was?”  Sherlock’s eyes darted back and forth between the page in John’s hand and his face.  John could practically see the

“No.  Without more to go on, we couldn’t risk giving him the wrong antivenin and making it worse.  He lost two fingers on his right hand, poor sod.”  John shook his head and dropped the report back on the table.  

“These results have some similarities to the bungarotoxin family of neurotoxins, but there are some traces that suggest nucleases as well,” Sherlock added, letting his eye wander away from the data on the report in favour of examining the photographs.  “John, look at this one,” he demanded, picking up a photograph that appeared to be a close-up of where Lydia Roylott’s neck joined her shoulder.  “What do you see?”  Sherlock asked, breaking into John’s examination.

“Necrosis, certainly.”  John began, wanting, just as he had with the trainers, to avoid making a fool of himself.  “The skin’s broken and peeling in places.  Suggests rapid swelling.  Ah, there’s some distinct striations coming out of the necrotized flesh, so you can trace the movement of whatever’s causing the cell death.”  John passed the photo back to Sherlock with a small, self-deprecating smile, “And what have I missed?”

Sherlock pointed to the center of the picture to two even darker round wounds in the meat of her shoulder.  The black on black tones of the puncture wounds against the skin around them meant that they blended into the rest of the skin in the picture, but now that Sherlock had pointed them out, they appeared to be the center of the damage.

“What could do that?”  John asked, staring at the picture still in Sherlock’s hand.  “I mean, they’re too far apart to be a spider bite, aren’t they?”

“Mmm, they are,” Sherlock agreed absently.  “I’ve got a theory, but it will require us going back to the house to either confirm or refute it.”

“Lucky we’re on for dinner, then,” John answered.  As Sherlock started shuffling all of the papers and photographs back into the folder, a thought struck John, “Why keep all of this out of the final report, though?  This clearly isn’t the nothing that the other version led her to believe.”

“Not certain,” Sherlock said speculatively, “But, balance of probability would suggest some sort of collusion between our Doctors Ademar and Roylott.”

“Collusion?  About what?”  John passed back the picture he and Sherlock had been examining, trying to squash the flutter in his chest when their fingers tangled briefly under the print.  “I mean, it’s not really hard to see Roylott’s a bit of a prick.  Not like it’d be worth getting Ademar to hide that.”  Folder resorted, John flicked the light in the conference room off and they both retraced their steps to Ademar’s office to return the file.

Sherlock shook his head pensively, “No, no.  Nothing like that.  Roylott doesn’t seem the sort to demand that someone else bear his secrets.  He’d much rather keep those to himself.  He’s more the sort to want to control other people’s secrets.  Leverage.”  Sherlock frowned as if a thought had just occurred to him, unconsciously wiping the back of his right hand against the leg of his trousers.  John scowled and filed this new tidbit of information away for further analysis later.

“Did you find what you needed?”  Ademar’s pleasant demeanour seemed a bit more strained than it had when they’d arrived.  “Poor girl.  I just wish there was more we could have done for her.”

“Yes, it was most illuminating.”  Sherlock’s smile pasted itself back in place.  “Tell me, you said you knew Dr. Roylott from when you were younger?”  

“Oh, yes.”  Ademar shook his head fondly at the memory, “We were quite the pair in med school.  Always right up to our necks in mischief.  You know what that’s like, I bet.  Study hard, play harder, eh, Dr. Watson?”

“Not too hard, I hope,” John responded, forcing a joviality he didn’t really feel into his tone.  He’d known boys like Ademar in med school.  The kind who’d orbited the sort with a gravitational well of magnetism like Roylott would surely have had in his youth.  The kind who wanted so desperately to fit in, but who pushed anything just that one step too far.  The kind who could easily find themselves in over their heads and abandoned, or blackmailed, by the guys who’d gotten them there in the first place.

“Well, the folly of misspent youth.  Sometimes I wish I could go back.  Be young and reckless again.”  He rose and shook Sherlock’s and then John’s hand in farewell.  John tried to hide his grimace when he pulled back from the weak and clammy grip.  “I’m so glad I could be of service.  Do call if you find anything.  We’re all just shattered over what happened to Lydia.”

Back in the corridor again, John picked up the thread of their earlier conversation, “So what?  He’s got something on Ademar that Ademar’d rather not see the light of day?”  At Sherlock’s nod he continued, “But how would that tie into all this?”

“Clearly there’s some sort of quid pro quo situation here.  Although how direct the link is remains to be seen.”

“ _Quid pro quo_?”  John smirked up at Sherlock, “ _Really_?”  When Sherlock met him with nothing more than a blank stare, John rolled his eyes, “Fine.  Don’t know why this one would be any different.”

“Is this another one of those who’s king or prime minister things you think I should care about?”  Sherlock’s smile gave the lie to his annoyed tone.

“Well, yeah.  I’d have thought you’d know _The Silence of the Lambs_.  It is about catching a murderer after all.  Psychological profiling instead of the science of deduction, but still.”  Sherlock just shook his head, and John laughed outright, “Okay, I’m adding it to the list.”

Sherlock clicked the keyless entry on their rental and slid into his seat, “There’s a list?  Since when?”

“Since always.”  John flopped into the passenger seat, “Since you didn’t know who James bloody Bond was.”

“I’ve got my laptop.  If we have time, we’ll watch it.”  Sherlock’s shy smile transformed his whole face, making him look more open, more like he was before Moriarty and his web had cost them both so much.  “A movie night; for old time’s sake.”

John smiled back, “Great.  Just like old times.”  He let the ride slip by in silence for a few minutes before he asked, “So what do you reckon?  Drugs?  Gambling?  Cheating old-age pensioners out of their savings?”

“Hmm? Oh, Ademar.”  Sherlock drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, “I’m not sure the what matters as much as the who and the why.  I’m fairly certain about the who, so if we can figure out what exactly is going on with Lydia’s demise, the why should become apparent.”

John shook his head derisively, “Well, whatever it is, I can’t imagine it being so bad that it’s worth murdering someone.”

“Perspective,” Sherlock reminded him gently.  “Everyone thinks their problems will bring the world to its knees.”

 

~~*~~

 

Back at the hotel, Sherlock retreated to his room shouting “Research, John” over the slamming door, so John shut himself up in his room to try to bring some closure to his farcical marriage.  Mycroft had, as promised, sent him a detailed email with the risks and benefits to his options along with attachments for an annulment agreement.  John sat and forced himself to read all of what Mycroft had sent before he signed his connection to Mary away.  

A few taps of the keyboard later, he sent the signed annulment back to Mycroft.  It should not, he mused, be as simple as typing his name into a PDF a half dozen times to make his marriage vanish as if it had never been.  

John leaned back in the rickety desk chair and sighed.That was it, then.  Well, partially.  Simply removing the source of his misery wasn’t the same as actively making himself happy, and he knew that.  He also knew who would make him happy.  Too bad knowing and having were two totally different things.  No.  A pity party would not resolve this.  John picked up his phone and typed:

_Busy?  I’m starving and could do with a bit of company._

He grabbed his book off the top of the dresser, resolving to give Sherlock ten minutes and then go get something to nibble on without him.  He’d scarcely found his page when his phone pinged:

_I’m not hungry, but I will accompany you, if you’d like.  SH_

John smiled at his phone and jumped up to put his shoes and coat back on.  Sherlock met him in the hall a few minutes later, and when he saw John’s good mood, his own smirk settled firmly on his face.

They made their way downstairs, but when they reached the ground floor, instead of heading to the car,  he detoured towards the hotel’s restaurant.

“You’ve been driving all over since we got here, so unless you know that the chef keeps dead bodies in the walk-in, we can just eat here.”  John steered Sherlock into a booth by a window, and made eye contact with the waitress for menus.

Sherlock smiled, “Thank you, John.  I take it my brother has been able to put his governmental oversight to good use for a change?”  

John nodded, “As of midnight tonight, I’ll officially be single again.  I must say, I’ll be glad to be clear of this mess.”

Sherlock nodded, his eyes fixed on the edge of the table while the rest of his face was a study in forced neutrality.

“Good afternoon, gentlemen, welcome to our restaurant.”  Their waitress’s chirpy arrival blocked John from pursuing as Sherlock put on his blandly pleasant company face.  “Did you have any questions about the menu, or were you ready to order?”  John picked a pasta dish that didn’t sound too heavy.  Sherlock didn’t get food, but he did order an espresso that sounded like it contained a weaponized amount of caffeine.

“I thought you only drank tea in the middle of the day?” John asked when their waitress had gone.  “What did you used to say?  Coffee tricked your brain into thinking you’d just woken up and it slowed you down?”

“I did, yes.”  Sherlock’s nostalgic smile went a long way to softening the blow of his short reply, “When I was away, I ended up in several places where tea would have set me apart.”

“So you did what you had to,” John finished, remembering all too well the times when the importance of blending in had far outweighed personal comfort.

“Quite.”  Sherlock’s shy smile, more infrequent now than even when they had been virtual strangers, made another appearance.  John returned it, feeling his breath catch at the peek Sherlock still gave him at the heart he swore he didn’t have.  John met Sherlock’s eyes, and the love and trust shining in those changeable depths made his breath catch.  He licked his lips, wanting to ask if Sherlock was still as married to his work as he’d claimed that first night, but the waitress returning with John’s food and Sherlock’s coffee shattered the moment.  John looked away, reminding himself sternly that Sherlock was his friend, and that standing up and taking for himself in no way granted him the right to overreach or to try to press Sherlock into something he wasn’t willing to give.

“What were you so anxious to rush off to look up when we got back?”  John asked around a mouthful of pasta.  “We’re stuck until we can talk to Helen and Dr. Roylott again, aren’t we?”

Sherlock shook his head, “Not necessarily.  I was looking into how quickly tissue begins to necrotize after cytotoxins are introduced.”

“It all depends,” John spoke with the surety that came from treating many a recluse bite.  “It comes down to the person, really.  Catch it early enough, if the venom’s simple enough, or if the person’s not allergic then the reaction’s virtually nonexistent, or at least not worth mentioning.  But, if the venom’s more complex or if the person’s allergic, then it can progress quite quickly.”

“That’s what I my research suggests,” Sherlock agreed.  “Basing our reasoning on the premise that Lydia’s skin appeared fairly normal at the time of her death, then the lack of a mention of necrosis in the coroner’s report Helen received points to a cover-up between the Dr. Ademar and whomever he’s protecting.”

John nodded, “But, if Helen saw some sort of dermal reaction?”

“Oh, I’ve no doubt Helen saw symptoms of a reaction on her sister’s skin,” Sherlock said dismissively.  “In all likelihood it was neither widespread enough nor advanced enough for her to make note of it in her panic over Lydia’s collapse and rapid deterioration.  Hence her failure to notice its omission in the final draft of the report she received.”

“And that’s how Dr. Ademar’s going to try to protect him?  Lying by omission and hoping he doesn’t get caught?”  John let his disbelief creep into his tone.  “Seems pretty risky to me.”

“A lie from omission is easier to sustain.”  Sherlock contemplated the dregs of his coffee as he swirled them in the bottom of his cup, “It works for many a spy every day.”

John couldn’t meet Sherlock’s eyes as he set his fork down on his empty plate and drained the last of his water, “I guess so.”  He forced himself to meet Sherlock’s gaze again, “Where do we go from here?”

“Dinner.  Helen’s offer to play hostess will allow us to talk to her and to Dr. Roylott again and, ideally, get to the bottom of this.”


	8. Wine You and Dine You

Sherlock knocked on John’s door promptly at six for their dinner with the Roylotts.  John, not even close to being ready, swore under his breath and went to let Sherlock in.

“John,” Sherlock said blinking at the man standing before him.  “I’m not the best gauge of social interactions, but I don’t think it’s usual to attend dinner in just trousers and no shirt.”

John rolled his eyes, “I know.  I know.”  He stepped back so Sherlock could step into the room.  “I’m almost ready.  Just.  Just sit there.  Give us a minute.”

John waited until Sherlock followed his instructions, settling on the desk chair before he turned back to the dresser drawer to survey his sartorial choices.  He sighed.  Surely he couldn’t go wrong with something simple, so he pulled on a blue shirt and black cardigan over the dark wash denims he was already wearing.

“Will this do?”  John turned around in front of Sherlock to let him get the full impact.

Sherlock’s tone was disinterested, “I’m sure it will, John.  This isn’t a date, after all.”  When he finally looked up from his phone, he blinked helplessly a few times before he could add, “You do look quite dashing, though.  Blue suits you.”  He stood and shook his head, clearly trying to rattle his brain into its usual track, “Shall we?”  John smiled at Sherlock’s dazed expression as he reached for his coat.  Maybe not so married to his work after all.

Dr. Roylott met them at the door when they got to the house, still clearly intent on overwriting his terrible first impression from the flat.  “Come in, come in!  I was just about to pour myself a drink while Helen puts the finishing touches on the dinner.  Can I get you anything?  I’ve got a very nice 25 year-old Glenlivet I just opened tonight.”

Sherlock shook his head, but John nodded, “That sounds great, ta.”  John followed the doctor into the sitting room where he was happy to pour and serve.  John took a sip, letting the smooth burn and smoky aftertaste light him up from the inside.  Turning back to the sitting room, he noticed Sherlock bent over what looked like a terrarium.

“Do you keep pets?”  John asked, pointing to the tank Sherlock now seemed to be sniffing.

“Oh, yes, that,” Roylott said, following John’s gaze.  “I developed a bit of a herpetology interest in uni.”  John’s face twisted in a mix of disgust and alarm, making Dr. Roylott laugh and slap John hard on the shoulder, “Not to worry.  They’re not poisonous.  Just a lovely pair of emerald tree boas and a couple of yellow dart frogs.  Come look.  They’re beautiful.”

Roylott dragged John over to join Sherlock at the terrarium, and the three of them peered in at the four creatures coexisting peacefully in their artificial habitat.  Even though John had never been much of a snake person, the lush green of the snakes coiling over their branches was eye-catching.  Punctuated with the flash of yellow as the frogs hopped in and out of their water, John could see the appeal.

“You’re not boring them with your snakes again, are you?”  Helen’s fond question from the kitchen door snapped all three of them back to reality.  “Dinner’s ready whenever you are.”

Dr. Roylott gestured them through to the dining room, pausing only to chastise his step-daughter, “Just because _you_ can’t appreciate my hobbies doesn’t mean our guests can’t.”  She nodded, clearly abashed at having spoken out of turn.

John elbowed Sherlock as they made their way to the table and mouthed “dick” when he’d caught Sherlock’s eye.  Sherlock smirked and rolled his eyes as he took his seat.  Helen and her step-father joined them, and Helen quickly began to pass around chicken karahi, dal, and even a plate of ashak.

John took some of everything, but his first bite of the karahi made him close his eyes, “Jesus Christ, Helen, this is amazing.”

“Thank you,” she said shyly.  “I wasn’t sure what you liked, so I picked some of my favourite recipes mum brought back from her work trips.  I know it’s not fancy, but--”

“That’s true it’s not,” Roylott cut in.  “I’d _suggested_ she make something a little nicer.  Courses would have been good, or at the very least something you’d recognize and would be able to pronounce.  Add a bit of class to the thing since she’s dragged you all this way.  But, you know how girls can be, stubborn about the silliest things.”

Sherlock looked up from where he’d been rearranging the couple of mouthfuls of each dish he’d put on his plate, “Do you really think it’s wise to antagonise the person gracious enough to cook your food, doctor?”

“I didn’t mean any harm,” he replied defensively.  “I just know this weird stuff isn’t to everyone’s taste.”

“Well, it’s to my taste, and Sherlock barely eats on cases anyway, so he’s no real measure,” John said, smirking in Sherlock’s direction before smiling warmly at Helen.  Sherlock directed a self-deprecating chuckle down at his plate and took a small bite of his karahi.

“Tell me, Dr. Roylott,” Sherlock said after he’d swallowed, “How do you know Dr. Ademar?  He let on that the two of you were friends when we went to pay him a visit today.”

Emerson Roylott paled, “I-He-We were at uni together.  Med school.”  He seemed to recover his good humour when he continued, “Don’t let his shyness fool you, he’s a good guy.  We were such a pair back then.  Always getting into a bit of a scrape.  Nothing too serious, of course, but you know how it is.  Boys will be boys.  Why do you ask?”

“Oh, just something he said.”  Sherlock waved his hand dismissively.  “It never ceases to amaze me what people are willing to do for the people they call friends.”

“Too right,” Roylott nodded.  “Friends and family are all we have in the end, aren’t they.  Richard and I have stuck together through thick and thin, make no mistake.”

“Of course you would,” John agreed.  “The lows are when you need a friend the most.”

“Not to change the subject,” Sherlock interjected, “But, could you tell me a bit more about your reptile collection, Dr. Roylott?”

Dr. Roylott smiled, “Certainly.  I’ve got the boas and the frogs you saw before dinner.  They stay in the house, but I’ve got a monitor lizard and a hyena I let roam the grounds.  If you’d like, we can go down after dinner to see if they’ll come up to the house.”

“Bloody hell, is that even legal?” John asked, choking on his water.

“Oh, yes,” Helen chimed in.  “There’s all sorts of permits and requirements, but with all the land we’ve got around the house, the hyena actually seems quite content.  He comes up to the house sometimes to socialise.  He can’t half scare you if he starts howling in the dark, but you get used to it.  I don’t see the monitor lizard enough to know how he feels about the whole situation, but I guess no news is good news, isn’t it.”

John looked at Helen incredulously, “That doesn’t bother you?  I can’t imagine a hyena’d be something you’d want to happen upon in the dark.”

“Helen knows better than to go wandering about at night,” Roylott answered for her.

Helen’s answering smile looked a little forced, “That’s true enough.”  They lapsed into silence, and Helen took advantage of the break in conversation to rise and start gathering their now empty plates.  Sherlock, in a rather uncharacteristic gesture, stood to help her.  As they moved off into the kitchen carrying dirty dishes and silverware, Sherlock leaned in to murmur softly in Helen’s ear.  She blinked up and him, but when he put on his most winning smile and added to whatever he’d said first, she eventually nodded.

“She is single, you know.”  Dr. Roylott’s words snapped John out of his reverie.  “It’d be nice to have a doctor around a bit more.  Someone who knows the trade for me.  Someone who’s financially independent for her.”

John blinked, helpless in the face of Dr. Roylott’s non sequitur.  How could he possibly think someone with John’s abysmal track record, not to mention age, would be a good fit for his step-daughter.

“John,” Sherlock popped his head in from the kitchen with a perfectly timed interruption, “I asked Helen if we could have a look at Lydia’s room.”

“I’m assuming she agreed,” he responded, standing from the table.

“Of course,” Helen said.  “You’re here, so we might as well make the most of it.”

Dr. Roylott rose, but made no move to follow.  “I’ve got a bit of work to finish, so you three go on and have your look.  I’ll be in the office.”

“Shall we?” Helen asked.  John and Sherlock nodded, and the three of them made their way up the stairs and into the first storey hallway.  

“Blimey, this place isn’t small, is it?”  John’s sense of tact over money had not improved.  He caught Sherlock’s smirk out of the corner of his eye and heard his soft laugh under Helen’s reply that no, it wasn’t small, and that seven bedrooms were more than she could ever imagine them really needing.

“This is Lydia’s room,” Helen said, producing a key and unlocking the bedroom closest to the master suite.  

She let them into Lydia’s room, and to John’s eye, it seemed to be exactly as she had promised in their initial interview: the same as the night Lydia died.  The bed was a tangled mess of sheets and duvet.  One pillow hung haphazardly off the bed, and the alarm clock had been knocked off the nightstand.  It was laying halfway across the room, the darkened screen cracked and lifeless.  Sherlock stepped into the room ahead of John, turning to take in everything about the place from the walls to the rug.  John left Sherlock to his own system of investigating to look around for himself.  A map on the adjacent wall was full of pins with dates written in different coloured ink on the flags.  A legend at the bottom separated the colours into Lydia’s, Helen’s, and their parents’ respective travels.  The desk situated under the window on the far side of the room was covered in papers, a diary, a few scattered pens and pencils, and a closed laptop.  John lifted the lid of the laptop, and when the screen flared to life, a half-finished email to Michael still stood open on the desktop.  He sighed.  Lydia’s room lay preserved like some sort of ruin.  A modern Pompeii.  It was no wonder, with the night of her sister’s death suspended as if it had only happened the night before right next door, Helen was having trouble moving past her sister’s death.

“Helen?” Sherlock asked, snapping John’s attention back to the actual task at hand.  “Why is Lydia’s bed bolted to the floor?”

“Seizures,” Helen responded from her position in the doorway.  “She didn’t usually have any sort of episodes at night, but Dr. Roylott said we couldn’t be too careful.  He was always worried she’d get herself hurt alone in here, especially since she kept the door locked.”  

Sherlock hummed to himself.  His focus had shifted to the shelf next to Lydia’s bed that was full of hockey trophies and ribbons.  “How long has this been here?”

“Oh, ages.  Dad helped her build it her first summer home from school.”  Helen ran her fingers across one of the ribbons dangling off the handle of a trophy, “She was always so much better at sport than I was.”

“And the vent,” Sherlock prodded pointing to the grate over his head, “Was the central air always a part of the house?”

“I think so, or if it wasn’t, Mum and Dad had it installed when I was still too young to remember.”  Helen looked at the vent set high in the wall above her sister’s awards as if seeing it for the first time.  “There’s one like that between this room and mine too.  We used to whisper through it nights when we couldn’t sleep.”  Seemingly apropos of nothing, Helen crossed back to the bedroom door and pulled it softly closed before returning to Sherlock’s side.  “Mr. Holmes,” she murmured softly, “Can I confide in you about something?”

“Yes,” Sherlock drew the word out with an air of uncertainty.  

“The other reason I wanted to hire you is, well, the whistling hasn’t stopped.”  Sherlock frowned at this new information, and Helen hastened to continue, “Not at first.  There were a few months after Lydia died with nothing, but they started up again.”

The light of connection shone in Sherlock’s eye when he asked, “This wouldn’t happen to have coincided with the release of the coroner’s inquest report and the official closing of your sister’s death, would it?”

“Well, it was a bit after, but yes, I suppose it would.”  Helen’s unease seemed to grow with Sherlock’s certainty, “You don’t think there’s a connection, do you?”

“I can’t imagine why you _wouldn’t_ think there’s a link.”  Sherlock paced across to the window that looked out onto the sprawling backyard.  “What happens to your sister’s money now that she’s deceased?”

“Oh, um, it’s mine now.”  Helen blushed, “You don’t think _I_ did this, do you?”

“No, no, don’t be ridiculous,” John interjected.  “You didn’t need it; you have a trust of your own, right?”

Helen nodded, “That’s right.  We both used some of our funds to pay for university, but we were also both saving as much of it as we could.  You just never know these days.”

“Who gets your money if both of you die?”  Sherlock asked, turning from the window.

“My mum, I guess.  I think it would go to the closest surviving relative.  It’s all laid out in dad’s will, but we’d have to talk to his solicitor if you wanted the details.”

Sherlock waved a hand to dismiss her suggestion, “No need.  Now, let me think a moment.”  

“Is he alright?”  Helen asked John, pointing at Sherlock who was stood stock still in the middle of the room with his eyes closed, letting, John assumed, all of the pieces come together in his mind.

“Yeah.  He’s thinking.  I think.”  John’s self-deprecating grin at his continued inability to articulate Sherlock’s memory processes made Helen laugh softly.  

“Right,” Sherlock said, clapping his hands together and making them both jump, “Helen, you said you were still hearing the whistling?”

“Yes.  But it seems like it’s coming directly from Lydia’s room now, if that matters.”

“Oh, it _all_ matters,” Sherlock responded gleefully.  “Now, would it be possible to see the good doctor’s room before we discuss where to go from here?”

“Um, I think so.”  Helen wrung her hands together at the idea of invading the doctor’s private space.  “Let me just check he’s still downstairs working and then yes.”  Helen scooted out of the bedroom, leaving John and Sherlock standing in this shrine to a dead girl.

John’s phone beeped in his trouser pocket, breaking the silence.  He pulled it out to turn it off, but when he saw who the message was from he shook his head, muttering, “What the bloody hell could Mycroft _possibly_ want now?”

“Final follow up and debriefing on your soon-to-be former spouse, I’d say,” Sherlock said dispassionately from behind him.

“ _Why_ , though,” John burst in frustration, “What else could there be to say?”

“Balance of probability rests on Moriarty,” Sherlock answered.

“What?  I thought he was dead and the message was a hoax.”

Sherlock shook his head, “You know the myth of the chimera, surely?  The changing face of evil?”  John nodded, prompting Sherlock to continue, “It’s a similar principle to that.  Someone with a fairly intimate tie to Moriarty pushed the message through in a bid to either excite attention or seize control.”

“No, Sherlock, no.  You said you destroyed his network.”  John hoped Sherlock wouldn’t pick up the traces of panic he could hear in his own voice.

“Scraps will always linger.  Depending on who they are and what they’ve done, a life of incarceration may be preferable to a life on the run, so I’d wager it was to excite attention from the authorities.”

John opened his mouth to answer when Helen popped her head around the doorframe, “He’s eyes deep, this way.”  She motioned them out of Lydia’s room and into the master suite next door.

They followed her into a luxuriously appointed bedroom.  The monstrosity of a four poster bed dominated the room, but an equally ostentatious dresser along with a sizeable desk also took up space of their own.  The desk was piled high with a mix of medical texts and herpetology guides.

“I thought Roylott said the only animals on the property were reptiles and a hyena?”  John asked from where he’d paused by the dresser.

“Yes,” Helen answered, “Just the snakes, the frogs, the lizard, and the hyena, why?”

John picked up a saucer of milk that had been left on top of the dresser, “What’s this, then?”

“I-I’m not sure.”  Helen looked at Sherlock, who was prodding his way through the books on the desk, “Mr. Holmes?”

“Hmm?  Oh, the milk.  Most likely a companion to this,” Sherlock brandished a choke chain attached to a long dog lead.  “A little at-home veterinary care is probably infinitely easier when you can convince your patient to drink a bit of a sedative.”  He dropped the lead back into the crate of pet supplies stored under the desk, and moved to stand, pausing to glance with some interest at the seat of Dr. Roylott’s desk chair.  Once he’d straightened back up, he regarded Helen intently.  “Helen, John and I would like to spend the night.”

“ _What_?”  Helen looked completely flabbergasted.  “I don’t think-”

“Nothing official,” Sherlock said shaking his head, “but I’m fairly certain you’re in rather serious danger, so this is quite necessary.  Listen, John and I are staying at a hotel that’s only a fifteen minute drive from here.  Once we leave, go to bed as soon as you can, and once Dr. Roylott goes to bed, text me.  We’ll come back and spend the night in your room.”

“Okay, but what about me?  I’ve got work in the morning.  I can’t just not sleep.”

“Simple.  We’ll come to your room, and you can go sleep in the next bedroom down the hall.  John and I won’t be noisy if that’s what you’re afraid of, and I think we’ll be able to sort this whole business out by morning.”

“No more whistling and clanging in the dead of night?”  Helen asked hopefully.  

“No more whistling and clanging,” Sherlock confirmed.  “And, if this turns out the way I suspect it will, we’ll even know with certainty what happened to Lydia.”

“Oh, thank you both,” Helen cried, flinging her arms first around Sherlock and then John.  “I’ll be so glad to have this whole mess figured out.”

Sherlock’s smile was more of a grimace in the face of her effusiveness and he cringed at her embrace, but John hugged her back and he couldn’t help but grin at how hopeful she was.

“Let’s get you on your way so we can put this scheme into action,” Helen said brightly.

“We’ll certainly do our best,” John promised as she led them back downstairs to say their goodbyes.

Dr. Roylott met them in the sitting room, “Off already?  I hope Helen didn’t wear you out with her outlandish theories.”

“Not at all, doctor,” Sherlock replied, his superficial smile pasted firmly in place.  “Our visit was most informative, and I hope to provide you with my findings sometime tomorrow.”  

A flash of surprise flitted across his face, “Oh, do you really think so?”  Dr. Roylott forced a laugh, “I can’t imagine there’d be too many clues left.  Even if something untoward did happen.”

“You wouldn’t believe the something Sherlock can make out of what looks like nothing,” John shook his head as he tugged his coat and scarf into place.  “Bloody impressive.”

Sherlock flushed slightly as a small, genuine smile crinkled the corners of his eyes, “Yes, well.  Thank you for dinner, Miss Roylott, but for now, we’ll say goodnight.”

On the drive back to the hotel, they were both quiet, but after such a productive day, John couldn’t stand the idea of holing up in his room to simply await Sherlock’s summons.  He dithered silently, trying to find a way to extend the camaraderie from dinner.  A glance over at Sherlock showed no such interest.  Eyes fixed on the road, his face rested in its usual impassive lines.  Well, he could hardly expect Sherlock to read his mind about this, especially since he’d felt like he’d been swinging wildly between extremes himself.  

Back at their rooms, John spoke up hesitantly, “Um, Sherlock?”  When Sherlock turned back, John barrelled ahead before he could lose his nerve, “I know we’ve got to stay up to wait for Helen, so if you wanted, or you weren’t too busy, we could give that movie a go.”

“Is this the one about American cannibals you mentioned earlier today?”  Sherlock asked, the barest trace of a smile lighting his eyes.

“Yeah,” John said, “That’s the one.”  Sherlock paused, his hand resting on the door to his room, for so long that John’s confidence began to waver.  “You know what, never mind, it’s been kind of a long day and-”

“No, no,” Sherlock broke in, examining John’s face for all his minute tells, “Let’s.  You need something to help you stay awake until we go back to the house, and I don’t really feel like sitting alone and reading for an undetermined amount of time.”

“Oh, well okay then,” John nodded, silently relieved Sherlock had taken him up on his offer.  “Let me pop into something warmer in case we’re wandering around outside in the dark, and I’ll be right over.”

Inside his room, John hastily began shedding his clothes from dinner in case Sherlock had a change of heart.  He exchanged his dress shirt for a much thicker button down and a warmer jumper and pulled on the sturdiest pair of jeans and shoes he had with him.  Sheer force of habit made him glance around as he rifled through to the bottom of his bag and extracted his gun.  He tucked it into the pocket of his overcoat before he grabbed his phone and wallet to go next door.  

Sherlock had left the door propped open with the latch again, so John just let himself in to find his friend fiddling with the laptop set up on the coffee table.

“God, I haven’t seen this movie in ages,” John sighed, flopping down on the sofa.  Sherlock clicked play and flicked off the overhead light, leaving them in only the dim glow from a lamp on a side table and came to sit next to him.  Sherlock scowled at the sombre opening music and Clarice Starling’s lonely run through the training course.  “Don’t be like that,” John needled, bumping Sherlock’s arm with his elbow and smiling when he felt Sherlock relax into the sofa, “I promise it’s going to be right in that sensationalist vein, you’ll love it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My most sincere apologies for the delay. This weekend got away from me, but I'll be back to regular, on time updates for the remainder of this fic.


	9. Look at Me, See Me

Two hours later, John rose and flipped the lid of Sherlock’s laptop closed.  

“Well? What did you think,” he asked, slightly nervous that Sherlock had kept silent through the entire thing.

“There is no realm of reality where that movie was following standard law enforcement procedure,” Sherlock said scowling up at John.

“Well, yes,” John tried to defend, “But it’s not meant to be-”

“All the same,” Sherlock interjected, “I rather liked it.  You were right, it’s sensationalist in the extreme.  How did you know about this?”

“I thought everyone knew about _Silence of the Lambs_ ,” John said, flopping back down on the couch, “It was huge when it first came out.  I snuck in to see it with my mate Mark, and I don’t think either of us could sleep with the lights off for at least a week.”  John laughed at the memory of his younger self digging his old nightlight out of the back of the closet because he’d needed that glow until he’d convinced himself that Buffalo Bill was not actually lurking in the shadows of his darkened bedroom.  “Ruined ‘Goodbye Horses’ for me too, come to that.”

Sherlock’s answering smile was brilliant, “I can well believe it.  No, no, I can see why something like this would appeal to your wilder side.  Sneaking out to go see it was probably the first time you’d ever really struck out for yourself.”

John blinked, still just astonished by Sherlock’s observational skills as he had been on day one, “Well, yeah, actually.  How’d you know?”

“John,” Sherlock responded reproachfully, “You know my methods.”

“Yes, but I’d still like a peek behind the curtain,” John said, refusing to back down.  Asking Sherlock to showcase his talents always seemed like the compliment that made him shine the brightest.

“You told me when we began this case that you could see Dr. Roylott dividing his personality neatly into his public and private persona,” Sherlock began.  John nodded, prompting Sherlock to continue, “You posited that it was possible for such a division to exist and pointed to your father as proof.  Your exact words about your father were that he was ‘the nicest guy you’d ever meet on a building site, but at home he could be a nightmare, especially if you tried to argue with him once he’d put his foot down.’  Now, given that, the fact that you told me you snuck in to see it with a friend, and your use of a nightlight rather than a hallway or bathroom light suggests secret.  The secret’s clearly not Mark, otherwise the focus of your deception would center around the fact that you went to see the movie with him when you told me this story.  It doesn’t, so it must be the movie itself.  Assuming an average age gap in siblings among people around your age of three to four years, Harry would already be the family pariah by the time you’re fifteen, which was when the movie saw theatrical release.  So, with Harry labelled a lost cause, that leaves darling John to carry all the family’s hopes and dreams.  You wouldn’t want to make mummy upset or daddy angry, so when he ‘puts his foot down’ as you say and tells you this is too violent and you cannot go, of course your answer is ‘yes, sir.’  But I know you, John.  You were an addict, even then, so when Mark came calling, off you went.”

“You really can make something out of nothing,” John said, clearly awestruck.  “You got all that from me saying I snuck into a movie and then had to sleep with a nightlight?”

“Not just that, the fact that you talk about what was likely a very eye-opening experience with this genre with such a nostalgic tone helped as well.”  Sherlock said, shaking his head.  “Your continued amazement at what is really is just simple observation is rather comfortingly predictable.”  Sherlock stood, glancing back at John, “I’m going to make some tea since we could be awake for a while, would you like any?”

“Oh, um, sure.  Thanks.”  While Sherlock filled the kettle and prepped their mugs, John watched his hands move with the quiet competence that came from routine.  “Can I ask you something?” John blurted without really thinking.  He flushed, suspecting he’d crossed a line, but the way they had collaborated today, the easy intimacy, had made him bolder than he’d been since Sherlock’s return.

Sherlock glanced over his shoulder, “Only if I can ask you something back.”

“Okay,” John responded readily, his curiosity overriding his normally taciturn nature.

Sherlock returned to the couch and handed John’s mug across, “Ask away.”

“Why did you leave?”  John asked.  The one thing that Sherlock had always dodged.

Sherlock grimaced, “I had to.  You know what Moriarty said, that he’d burn the heart out of me.”  John nodded, but Sherlock just shrugged, “He tried.  He brought guns to a battle of wits, so I had to stop him.  A simple matter of action and reaction.”  John was fairly certain Sherlock was editing his story quite heavily, but let it go for the moment.  He’d waited this long to get the full story; he could wait a bit longer.  Sherlock set his mug down on the coffee table and curled himself sideways onto the sofa, closing his eyes.  John thought he’d never seen his friend look so tired.  “Why did you come back?”  Sherlock asked softly, his eyes still closed.

“I-” John hesitated.  He’d never thought about the whys and wherefores of his decision to forgive Sherlock for his deception, and he didn’t think he could articulate it now.

“John,” Sherlock drawled, cracking one eye, “I believe we had an agreement.”

“I know,” John replied, “I’m just thinking is all.”  He sighed and leaned back, trying to relax into a more revelatory frame of mind.  “Did you read my blog?  The first entry after you came back?”

Sherlock shook his head against the cushion, “You know I don’t read that overly romanticized drivel you write.”

“Yes, you do,” John said, smiling and poking Sherlock’s arm, “How else would you know it’s overly romanticized drivel?”  Sherlock snorted.  “Anyway, I know you know I didn’t want to let you back in.”  A nod.  “But, there’s something about the chase and the puzzle.  I think I forgave you in my head before I ever said it out loud because I need you.”

“You’re a gambler, John,” Sherlock said, opening his eyes.  “You need the thrill of the unknown and the razor edge of disaster to wake you up and make you feel alive.  It’s why you snuck into movies as a teenager.  It’s why you went to war as an adult.”

“Mycroft said the same thing to me the night we went to Brixton, you know,” John pointed out.

“Mmm, well he would, wouldn’t he.”  Sherlock nodded sagely, “Mycroft always has to be the smart one.”

John braced himself and took the plunge to ask the thing he’d been pondering since Sherlock had turned up at The Landmark, but that had reasserted itself, thanks to Sherlock’s more bizarre than normal behavior that morning. “What did you do while you were away?”

Sherlock’s eyes slid away from John’s and his long fingers plucked idly at the cuff of his shirt.  “You might do better to ask what I didn’t do, to be honest.”  He clenched both his hands into fists, stopping the nervous motion of his fingers at his wrists before he continued, “I did whatever it took to be able to come back to you and to make sure that Moriarty would never be someone who could threaten us again.”  

John sighed.  Evasion again.  He wasn’t really sure why he’d expected anything different, but he had still been hopeful that Sherlock would let him in, even if it was only for a moment.  When he looked back over, he saw Sherlock gazing anxiously down, refusing to meet John’s eyes.  

“Try to understand, John,” Sherlock said to his hands, “I had to make difficult decisions when I was out in the field.  Deep cover is nothing like one of your James Bond films.”

“If...if something was wrong, you would tell me, wouldn’t you?  You’d let me help you?” John asked, casting his mind back over bumps in the night, jumps at unexpected noises,  and stiffness that never quite seemed to dissipate.

“That’s two questions, John,” Sherlock chided, “It’s my turn now.”

“No, Sherlock,” John snapped, suddenly on his guard, “I want an answer.  If something’s wrong, I want to know.  I want to help.”

“It’s nothing, John.  I’m fine on-”

“Don’t you try to tell me you’re fine on your own,” John interrupted.  “I know you think alone protects you, but it doesn’t.  Not really.”

“Try to keep a little perspective, John,” Sherlock scolded mildly.  “It’s a simple question of form and function.  My brain functions as it should, so the form of the transport is secondary.”

“Your form’s not secondary to me,” slipped out of John’s mouth before he could stop it.  “Oh, god,” he muttered, blushing and covering his face with his hands, “Please just forget I said that.”

A predatory gleam came into Sherlock’s eye, “I’m not that easily fooled.  What did you mean?”

“Nothing,” John protested from behind his hands, “It was really nothing.  Please, just forget it.”

“Noo,” Sherlock drew the word out in thought, “I don’t think it was ‘nothing.’  I’ll ask again, John, what did you mean?”

“I-You-Well, just look at yourself,” John spluttered.  When Sherlock only stared blankly back at him, John rolled his eyes, “You’re gorgeous.  You must know.  You certainly _dress_ like you know.”

Sherlock waved that explanation away, “Do you know when I started wearing suits, John?”  John shook his head.  “When I was seven.  My parents sent me to a preparatory school as soon as they could.  I dress the way I do because it’s practically all I’ve ever known.”

“Why, though?”  John asked, sidetracked by how young Sherlock had been when he’d gone away to school.

“Could you imagine them sending a child like me, or Mycroft for that matter, to the local comprehensive?”  John smirked and shook his head.  “It’s function yet again, John.  When I work, I’m dressed for work.  When I’m not working, I’m dressed for not working.  You do exactly the same thing.”

“I suppose,” John conceded.  “So you really don’t get it, do you?”  He leaned forward into Sherlock’s space, trying to wrap his mind around the idea that someone so observant could be so oblivious about the effect his looks had on other people.  Sherlock could only muster a weak shake of his head in response to John’s question.

“There’s very little to ‘get’, John,” Sherlock said, rolling his eyes.  “I am now as I have been virtually all of my life.”

“But?” John prompted, hearing the qualifier in Sherlock’s voice.  

“What?” Caught out, Sherlock fell back on defensiveness.

“I heard the ‘but’ in there, Sherlock,” John said, smiling gently to try to show Sherlock he wasn’t mocking him.  “So here’s my next question: but what?”

Sherlock drew in a deep breath and blew it out through his nose.  He had the determined expression of someone about to plunge into very dark, cold water when he opened his mouth, “I have come to realize the value in caring about other people.  Caring for other people.  About being there when someone needs me.  About the idea that there’s more to life than just work.”

John blinked, overwhelmed by Sherlock’s honesty, “So, you’re telling me something convinced you to slow down and take pleasure from life?”

“Not something,” Sherlock corrected, suddenly coming over all coy and refusing to meet John’s eye.  

“Some _one_ , then?” John asked, unable to keep the note of incredulity out of his voice.

“Don’t sound so shocked,” Sherlock scolded, “I am, it would seem, capable of some tender feelings.”

“Blimey,” John gaped, “Who is it?  Janine?  She did seem awfully keen, even after that whole fake engagement thing.”

“What?   _Janine_?” Sherlock shook his head, “No, she’s entertaining, to be sure, but she’s also hideously opportunistic and conniving.  On balance, not the best example of altruism.”

“No, I suppose not.”  John glanced at the clock, wondering how long he would get to keep Sherlock talking, “I’m for some more tea.  Can I make you some?”

“Yes, thanks,” Sherlock smiled, handing his mug over.

John used his trip across the room to the kettle and his focus on refreshing their mugs to try to round up his scattered thoughts.  The fact that Sherlock had become more sentimental since their experiences with Moriarty was shocking, but that a particular person had been the catalyst for such a change was even more astonishing.  If this whole reevaluation hadn’t been brought on by Janine, then John had no idea who it could be.  His mind spun out a whirlwind of possibilities, most beyond the realm of believability, but there were one or two who snagged in his mind as realistic options, namely Molly and Greg.

“Here it is,” John said as he handed Sherlock’s refreshed mug to him.  Sherlock smiled his thanks and took a quick sip before scowling at the temperature and setting it on the coffee table to cool.  John, never one to shy away from danger, resettled himself half of a cushion closer to Sherlock than he had been before and faced his friend.  

Sherlock, seemingly unbothered by John’s new proximity, re-curled himself sideways on the sofa and laid his head back down, “I think,” he said, slanting his eyes up to meet John’s, “It’s my turn to ask.”  

“Go on, then,” John said, sounding bolder than he felt.

“Why are you jealous of Janine?”  Sherlock asked without any artifice.

“I’m not,” John protested, sounding defensive even to his own ears.

“John,” Sherlock scolded, imbuing his name with enough recrimination to make John instantly regret his prevarication.  “I thought we had moved beyond such childish evasions.”

“We have, and I’m sorry,” John replied earnestly.  “I think,” he fidgeted, silently claiming nerves as he inched closer, “It, well, it’s complicated.  Mainly, I think I was jealous that she had the temerity to grab something she wanted.”

Sherlock shook his head as he leaned in to pick up his now drinkable tea, “I don’t think _I_ was ever something she truly wanted.”  He took a sip, but he continued to watch John over the rim for his reaction.  

“I don’t either,” John agreed, closing even more distance between them.  He could feel the soft heat radiating from Sherlock’s body, “More the way she wasn’t afraid.  That’s what I think really made me jealous.”

Mug safely back on the coffee table, Sherlock nodded as he resumed his earlier position.  “I can well believe that.  You’ve been a peacemaker your whole life, but that doesn’t mean you’ve liked it.  Hence, the front line medic posting, the gambling when you would come home on leave, the life chasing after someone like me.  You crave the rush of freedom that comes with taking risks.  Breaking free of the restraints you’ve put around yourself.”

“Does it still count as me answering if you put most of it together yourself?”  John teased, poking Sherlock’s arm.

“I’m sure it does,” Sherlock said with a small laugh, “I sincerely doubt this is something that follows strict rules of British Parliamentary Debate.”

“You don’t know who the prime minister is, but you know the rules of Parliamentary Debate?”  John jabbed Sherlock in the arm again, but he was slower to withdraw his hand this time, letting the silk of Sherlock’s shirt and the strength of his musculature tease across his fingertips.

“You can blame Mycroft for that,” Sherlock said, rolling his eyes.  “At one point early in his career he took it into his head that I was secretly longing to follow him into the shadow realm of politics.”

“God, I can imagine,” John groaned.  “He probably wanted to turn you into his puppet despot or something.”  While Sherlock laughed softly and drained the rest of his tea, John worked up the nerve to ask his next question, “So, go on then, who made you into this kinder, gentler Sherlock?”

“If you can’t deduce something as simple as that, I’m quite glad things like breathing are autonomic responses,” Sherlock answered.  

“Yeah, thanks,” John said, dismissing the less than subtle insult with a roll of his eyes.  “Can you at least give me a hint?”

Sherlock didn’t answer verbally, instead he leaned forward and planted the softest, sweetest kiss on John’s lips he’d ever felt.  “I just assumed you knew,” he whispered when he pulled back.  John blinked up to meet Sherlock’s gaze.  His face was completely open.  Trusting.  Offering John the thing he’d never realized he most wanted, with no reservation.

“I do now,” John murmured into the quiet space between them.  They would have to talk about this.  There were lies and mistrust and hurt feelings they needed to wade through and resolve, but for now he was determined to simply revel in the limitless potential that came with first kisses.  He stretched back towards Sherlock and kissed him again, just as gently as the first time.  Sherlock sighed against John’s lips and brought his hands up to rest lightly on his waist, but just when John let his tongue dart out to tease Sherlock’s lower lip, Sherlock’s phone pinged with a new text.

“That must be Helen,” Sherlock breathed as they parted.  John nodded, trying to get his breathing under control.  “The game,” Sherlock said ruefully-

“Is on,” John finished with a smile.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I definitely had "Goodbye Horses" on repeat while I wrote this chapter. You know, like you do.


	10. One Light in the Darkness

“Did you mean it?”  John asked as they pulled on their shoes and coats and Sherlock grabbed the rental keys.

“What?”  Sherlock glanced over from where he was fiddling with his scarf, a blush staining his cheeks, “Oh, what I said before?  Yes, I did.  Erm, that is to say, I do.”  Sherlock turned fully to face John, “I was sure you knew.  Are you ready?”

John smiled at Sherlock’s floundering reply; his reciprocation for John’s feelings had come as a bit of a shock, although certainly a pleasant one.  Knowing where he stood made his path forward much simpler, but John didn’t want to distract Sherlock when he was in the midst of a case.  Refocusing on the task at hand, he patted his pockets to check for wallet, phone, and gun, and finding them all where he expected, he nodded and they were on their way.  

In the car park, Sherlock tossed John the keys, “I have a few details to iron out on our way.  Do you remember the way to the house?”

“I think so,” John said, sliding into the driver’s seat, “And even if I don’t, you should be able to help; you’ll be in the same car and everything.”  

Sherlock smirked, “So I will.”  John rolled his eyes and fired up the engine.

“John,” Sherlock murmured into the quiet darkness of the car, “I feel it only fair to warn you that this endeavour tonight could be quite dangerous.”  

John glanced over at Sherlock, his eyes glued to the screen of his phone, the blue light casting his face in an eerie glow.  Even in the electrical half-light, Sherlock’s focus was turned inward instead of directed towards whatever was on the screen, and the corners of his mouth were creased with concern.

“I’ll be fine,” John assured, “We’ve been in tighter spots, surely?”

“If this turns out the way I think it will, this is not going to come down to something we can reason our way out of.”  Sherlock said matter-of-factly.  He clicked off his phone and put it into his coat pocket.  In the darkness of the passing countryside, Sherlock’s voice dropped to a soft murmur, “I’m not sure if I can protect you from this.”

John reached over from where he’d been resting his left hand on the gearshift and squeezed Sherlock’s hand where it lay in his lap, “We’ll be careful.  That’s all we can do.”  Sherlock squeezed back, “Besides,” John continued, using both hands to guide the car through a sharp curve, “Between my gun and your brain, there’s not much we can’t get out of.”

“Just promise me something,” Sherlock insisted, surprising John with his sudden fervor, “No matter what, promise me that you’ll stay awake and do exactly as I tell you until this whole business is sorted.”

“Okay,” John acquiesced, “I mean, I do normally, but okay.  Whatever you say.”  They drove the rest of the way to the Roylotts’ in silence.  John smiled into the darkness at how much a little bravery had done for him in just one evening.  He’d never expected Sherlock to let him in, to trust him, with the way their relationship had changed since his return.  Sherlock had come home much more withdrawn and careful.  Always making sure he was fully “on” whenever John came around.  Now, though, John hoped Sherlock would realize he didn’t have to do that.  They could just explore this together.  No rush, no expectations, nothing but the two of them and what they wanted.

“Park here,” Sherlock broke into his reverie, pointing to a spot behind a line of hedges that would keep the car concealed, “We’ll skirt around the house on foot and Helen will meet us at the back door.”

John double checked that his phone was set to silent and that his gun hadn’t leapt from his pocket, then he locked the car manually and fell in step behind Sherlock.  They made their way quickly and quietly around the privacy hedge that concealed the front of the house and through the gate into the back yard.  Sherlock led the way across the lawn towards the french doors at the back of the house where Helen was waiting.  Just as they mounted the steps to the back patio, a high pitched cackle made John jump out of his skin.

“Jesus Christ,” he whispered, grabbing Sherlock by the arm, “What the bloody fuck was that?”

Sherlock pointed to what looked like a dog running away across the lawn, “Dr. Roylott did say he kept a hyena.”

“This guy’s mental,” John muttered under his breath.  “Let’s get inside.”

“John,” Sherlock grabbed John’s hand to arrest his progress across the patio, “This really is going to be dangerous.  If you’d rather wait in the car or at the hotel, I’d understand.”

“No, Sherlock,” John snapped, “No.  I’m not just going to abandon you.  Not again, do you hear me?”  Sherlock, to his credit, just nodded, stunned in the face of John’s vehemence.  John searched his expression for any trace of deception before he nodded, “Alright, then.”  

“You’re lucky,” she murmured as they bundled into the sitting room, “The doctor forgot to put food out for Hector, so he sent me to do it.  Otherwise, I think you might have had to shinny up a drainpipe and crawl through a window.”

“That would have been no good,” Sherlock responded with a shake of his head.  “The upstairs windows are too narrow to fit two grown men except those in the master suite.”  At Helen’s dismayed stare, Sherlock cocked his head to one side, “Didn’t you notice?”

“No,” Helen murmured, “I didn’t.”  She shook her head, mentally erasing that potential non-starter.  “It doesn’t matter; you’re here now.  Let’s get you two settled.”

They wordlessly retraced their path from dinner earlier that night up the dark staircase and to the bedroom immediately to the right of Lydia’s.  “Well,” Helen whispered, “Here you are.  I’ll be in the bedroom just beyond if you need me.  I’ll go say goodnight to the doctor to give you a moment to get sorted.”

Sherlock smiled in reply before he turned and ushered John into Helen’s room.  He closed the door with a soft click, but once they were in, he seized John around the waist and pulled him flush against his chest, “We’ve got to be absolutely silent,” Sherlock breathed.  John nodded against Sherlock’s shoulder, afraid to even whisper.  “No extra light either since I’m not certain how much someone could see under the door or through the vent.”

John pulled his gun out of his pocket and set it on the desk before he arranged himself in the sturdy wooden chair.  Once he was situated, Sherlock started making a slow circuit of the bedroom, pausing only once to poke his head into the wardrobe and reemerge holding a hockey stick.  “No good at sport,” he mouthed once he was standing in the sliver of moonlight peeking in through a crack in the drapes.  John smiled and reached out to cover Sherlock’s hand where it was wrapped around the shaft in silent demonstration of his understanding.  He wanted to ask what in the hell Sherlock would possibly need in the dead of night with a bit of girl’s sport equipment, but he didn’t trust himself to be quiet enough about it.  The sound of the door next to them closing signalled Helen’s retreat to her temporary bedroom, so Sherlock settled on the edge of the bed.  

In the silence that engulfed them as they waited, time seemed to spin out endlessly.  John would check the alarm clock on the bedside table occasionally, but stopped once he realized that would neither make time move any faster nor would it hasten the arrival of whatever it was they were waiting for.  The soft shuffle of Sherlock rolling the stick between his palms would sometimes break the silence, but otherwise, Sherlock sat perfectly still, his catty corner angle allowing him to see both the door and John from either corner of his eyes.  

Between the darkness and the quiet, John felt himself starting to wane around two.  After he shook himself awake for a second time in less than half an hour, he stood, hoping the change in position would perk him up a bit, when a flicker of light from the vent made him freeze.  John crept across the room to where Sherlock was perched, “Did you see that?” He whispered up against Sherlock’s ear.  He nodded, pulling John down to sit next to him on the bed.  The silence descended on them again, but instead of the sleepy stillness from earlier, now the air around them vibrated with an expectancy that made John nervous.  He stole back over to the desk and retrieved his gun, ready to face whatever seemed to be about to happen.

John inched back across the bedroom, worried the least noise would give them away.  He was out in the middle of the room when a low, atonal whistle split the silence.  John whipped his head towards the wall between the sisters’ rooms and levelled his gun, but he couldn’t immediately get a visual on what could have possibly made such a sound.  He was about to turn to Sherlock to see if he could offer some sort of insight, but movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention.  Something was spiralling down the lamp Helen had sitting on her bedside table.  

“What the hell-” John started, but cut off as Sherlock leapt towards the lamp like a man possessed.  He brandished the hockey stick in front of him like a sword and shone his pocket torch at the undulating lamp like a spotlight.  The sudden light dazzled John, so he couldn’t take aim at whatever Sherlock was striking at with such mindless ferocity.  While Sherlock struggled, John heard the same low whistle from before followed by a hollow metal banging that sounded like it was coming from the room next door.  In just a scant minute more, Sherlock had whatever it was under some modicum of control and pinned against the baseboard with the foot of the hockey stick.

“John,” Sherlock panted, out of breath from the brief but vicious fight, “Turn on the lights.”  John reached for the lamp on the bedside table, but Sherlock dissuaded him, “Not that one.  I’m not sure I’ve got this thing under control, or even indeed what species it is.  The overhead light would be best.”

“Right,” John acknowledged and backed away towards the light switch by the door, refusing to turn his back on Sherlock in case he lost his upper hand.  When he turned on the light, he saw Sherlock leaning on the hockey stick that was pinning a meter-long snake the colour of dried mustard to the floor.  

“What the hell is that?”  John asked, wrinkling his nose at the vaguely arid smell of reptilian skin.

“I would have thought,” Sherlock said, the smirk evident in his voice, “That a soldier used to desert environments would recognize a snake when he saw one.”

“Oi,” John shot back, “Not helpful.”

“It is, for our purposes, a murder weapon,” Sherlock clarified.  “Now,” he continued, “Would you please go wake Miss Roylott and have her summon the police and then go find out what has happened to the good Dr. Roylott.”

“Right.”  John nodded once, then turned and left in the direction of Helen’s temporary bedroom.  He tapped softly on her door, and when she opened it, she was already dressed down to her shoes and her phone was in her hand.

“What’s going on?” Helen whispered.

“There’s some kind of snake in your room,” John responded, hurrying to continue at Helen’s frightened expression, “It’s fine.  Well, for now.  Sherlock’s got it trapped.  He needs you to ring the police.  If your stepdad’s got a spare tank somewhere, that probably wouldn’t be a bad thing to put the snake in until the coppers show up.”

“Right,” she nodded, looking determined, “Phone the police.  Find a tank for another snake.  You don’t think it’d work with the boas, do you?”

“I’m not sure, but I would guess not,” John shrugged, “Sherlock seems to think it’s pretty aggressive.  I need to go figure out what’s happened to your stepfather.  Will you be okay until I get back?”  When she nodded again, John turned and made his way down the hall to try to find Dr. Roylott.

“Check Lydia’s room first,” Sherlock ordered from his position leaned over the still-pinned snake as John passed by the open door.

When he got to Lydia’s room, the door was standing wide open, in direct contrast to how they had left it after their investigation during dinner.  John poked his head around the door, and was shocked to find Dr. Roylott sprawled out on the floor, completely unconscious.  Lydia’s desk chair was stood under the open vent that connected this room to Helen’s.  

“Sherlock,” John called through the vent, deciding to put Dr. Roylott’s means of intimidation to work for himself, “Sherlock, can you hear me?”

“I can,” Sherlock answered.  “May I assume you’ve found Dr. Roylott as unconscious as that ringing self-inflicted blow to the head sounded?”

“Um, yeah,” John confirmed, poking Roylott’s leg with his toe and watching it flop uselessly back.  “D’you have any cuffs or anything in case he comes ‘round?”

“I have a pair of Lestrade’s finest in my coat pocket, but you’ll have to come get them yourself,” Sherlock grunted, seemingly renewing his struggle with the snake.

John went back to the room where they’d started, and found Sherlock’s coat draped across the foot of the bed and Sherlock in a slightly adjusted position still pinning his quarry to the floor.  He rifled through the pockets until he came across a pair of the standard-issue rigid cuffs in one of the outer pockets, and waved them in triumph before returning to cuff Roylott to the bolted-down leg of Lydia’s bed.

“Helen’s going to try to find some kind of tank for that thing,” John said when he came back, pointing at the reptile still pinned to the baseboard.  “What kind of snake is it?”

“Based on the colour and the way it keeps rearing up to try to strike, I would hazard a guess it’s a member of the cobra family,” Sherlock grunted, shifting with his prisoner as it made another attempt to dislodge the hockey stick.

“That’s got to be illegal,” John insisted, googling cobra species as they talked to try to get a handle on what exactly they were dealing with.  The images that popped up in response to his searches stressed even his field medic sensibilities.

“It’s legal,” Helen said from the doorway.  “Dangerous and Wild Animals Act means it’s legal.  Not advisable, certainly, but legal.  I do know there’s a licensing process we all had to go through for the hyena, so I’m sure he just did something similar for this.  I couldn’t find a cage, but I’ve called the police almost fifteen minutes ago, so-” The doorbell cut her off, “That’ll be them!”

“He’s lucky that thing didn’t bite him,” John muttered, still flipping through results.  “Does Caspian cobra seem like a possibility?”  John asked, turning the screen to show Sherlock the picture he’d found.

“A distinct one, although it will be much easier to analyse when I’m not pinning it to the floor in an act of desperate self-preservation,” Sherlock said without real heat.

“Oh God, Sherlock,” John said, hovering uselessly at his shoulder, “This is ridiculous.  There’s got to be some sort of tank for it somewhere in this house.  No one knew he even had the thing until tonight.”  John cast about, as if Dr. Roylott had secreted a habitat for a snake-cum-murder weapon in the far corner of Helen’s bedroom, but a rattle from Lydia’s room drew him up short.

“What the fuck is going on?”  Dr. Roylott hollered.  He had, apparently, regained consciousness, but he did not seem especially thrilled to find himself tethered to the foot of his late stepdaughter’s bed.

“I’ll go,” John offered, rolling his eyes at the “yes, obviously,” look Sherlock directed his way.  He crossed back into Lydia’s room, only to be confronted with scowling, snarling imprisoned doctor.

“Let me go right now,” Roylott spat the instant John came into his line of sight.

“Not bloody likely, mate,” John laughed, leaning against the door.  “We’ve got your snake pinned down and your stepdaughter’s downstairs with the police, so I’d say you’re nicked.”

“John,” Sherlock shouted through the vent, “Less banter more cage, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“On it,” John called back.  He looked expectantly at Dr. Roylott, “Well?  Got a cage for that beast?”

“Fuck off,” Roylott spat derisively, “I won’t give you anything.”

“Check the dresser,” Sherlock voice interjected from through the vent.

“What?” John shouted back, “What dresser?”

“The obnoxiously large one in Roylott’s room.  You know he’s got to have someplace he keeps this beast, and since no one knew about it until tonight, then logically, he kept it somewhere in his room.”  

“Right,” John spun on his heel and marched out of the bedroom and down the hall to the master suite.  There was clearly no point in wasting time on Roylott if he was going to be mindlessly belligerent.  In the doctor’s room, John hit the jackpot.  A large, empty glass tank was out on the floor with the cover and a pair of snake tongs on the floor next to it.  He gathered up the scattered items and made his way back to Helen’s room.

“Oh, Dr. Watson,” Helen said, jumping up from her seat at the desk when he appeared in the doorway, “Do you need any help?”  The uniform officer she’d been speaking with scowled at her abrupt shift away from their conversation, but with a murmured word from Helen, his expression softened into one of grudging acceptance.

“I think Sherlock and I can handle it,” John said, waving her off.  She nodded and returned to finish her conversation with the officer, and John turned back to where Sherlock still stood, “So what do we need to do?”

“Come bring the tank here,” Sherlock instructed, “Turn it sideways; I don’t dare lift this thing up.”  Once John had the tank lying on its side, ready to receive the still struggling snake, Sherlock finished his instructions, “They strike fast, so be ready to put the lid on the moment it’s in.”

John nodded, “Ready when you are, then.”

Sherlock held out his hand for the tongs, and John passed them over before picking up the cover to the tank.  Sherlock clamped the tongs around the snake’s midsection just behind the hood before he let his weight off the hockey stick.  The snake immediately reared up and bared its fangs, struggling to get into a striking position, but Sherlock prevented that with his secure grip on the snake handling tongs.  

Sherlock dragged the snake over to the open cage and held it in place inside.  He flipped the tank right side up with the toe of his shoe, “Are you ready, John?” Sherlock asked, glancing over.  John nodded and moved so that he was hovering right over the mouth of the tank with the cover.  “On three then.  One.  Two.  Three.”   Sherlock released the cobra and John slapped the lid down just as it came back to try to strike at them.

“That thing moves like a bloody SCUD missile,” John huffed, leaning over the closed lid as the furious reptile inside aimed a couple more snaps at John’s arm through the partition.  “Please tell me there’s a plan for how to deal with this.”

“Of course there is,” Sherlock confirmed, storing the hockey stick back in the closet.  “I know the head herpetologist at the London Zoo.  Owes me a favour.  She can come pick all the reptiles up around nine.”

“Certainly,” Helen responded, a brilliant smile lighting her whole face, “But, how did you know that my stepfather was going to put a snake through my vent?”

“A combination of things,” Sherlock said, settling himself on the edge of Helen’s bed and addressing both her and the police, who had returned with the handcuffed Dr. Roylott secured between them.  “The photographic evidence in the coroner’s findings showed a bite on your sister’s shoulder, and the necrosis around the bite suggested she’d been attacked by something venomous.  That, plus the fact that your sister’s room smelled similar to the tank with the boas in it downstairs, began to indicate a venomous reptile.  A look at Dr. Roylott’s room revealed several books on keeping venomous snakes in captivity along with tongs long enough to safely handle a snake twice the size of the tree boas, but not heavy-duty enough to safely guide a monitor lizard.  Result: somehow Dr. Roylott obtained a fully venomous Caspian cobra which he concealed in the dresser in his bedroom, and trained it to follow simple commands with a set of whistles and taps, hence the whistling you and Lydia would hear during the night.  Mud on the desk chair shows he used it to give him enough height to be able to set it loose in Lydia’s room, and the rest was fairly straightforward.”

“How, though,” Helen asked, bewildered.

“How what?” Sherlock responded, “How did the cobra get into her room?  Simple.  The air vent above her bed.  It used the hockey trophies and memorabilia as a means of slithering out of the air vent and down into the room, and since this type of cobra is especially aggressive, she probably moved in her sleep, startling it, causing it to bite her.  How did he get an aggressive, venomous snake?  That I’m not as clear about, but I would hazard a guess that it was through some sort of black market exotic pet trading.

“If you check with Dr. Richard Ademar, I’m sure you’ll find he’s been concealing information that would indicate this cobra’s venom was what killed Lydia Roylott and that he was fully prepared to do the same should Helen meet a similar fate,” Sherlock spoke directly to the police, now.  

One of the officers nodded, and said, “Mr. Holmes, Dr. Watson, this seems to be fairly straightforward, so we’ll get Dr. Roylott here down to the station and get him processed.  You’re free to go, and Miss Roylott, you as well.  We’ll contact you if we need anything further.”  He inclined his head first to Helen then to Sherlock and John in a gesture of farewell before he and his partner escorted Dr. Roylott out the door and down to their waiting patrol car.

In the wake of her stepfather’s departure, Helen blinked back sudden tears, “Mr. Holmes, I can’t thank you enough for this.  I knew there was something suspicious about him.  It’s nice to have answers.  For myself and for Lydia.”

“I’m sure,” Sherlock replied, smiling at her relief. “Is there anything else?”  Even though he was trying to conceal it behind cordiality, John could see Sherlock’s posture melting into lines of exhaustion.

Helen could too, apparently, “Oh, no, no.  You two look as tired as I feel.  Go on, get some sleep.”  Sherlock nodded, and Helen turned to show them out, “What time will your friend be over to collect the reptiles?”

“Around nine is what she said when I sent her a text earlier this evening.  I provided her your number and she assured me she would call first.”  Sherlock turned at the front door and held out his hand, “It’s been a pleasure, Helen.”

Helen bypassed his outstretched hand to throw her arms around his neck one final time.  John smirked at the vaguely pained expression Sherlock always got when people touched him like this, “I’m so glad you were able to give Lydia some peace.  Goodnight, and do call if you’re ever in the area; I’d love to have you both over for dinner again.”

“Well,” John said as they ambled down the drive back to the car, “That’s her sorted.”

“Ideally,” Sherlock agreed.  He slipped into the passenger’s seat, but his whole body sagged into the leather once he’d sat down.

“I’m knackered,” John sighed as he settled behind the wheel.  “But going back to the hotel seems almost anticlimactic after all this.”

“How so?” Sherlock asked, glancing over at John.

“I don’t know,” John hedged, “Just, with all this excitement it seems kind of a shame to have it just end and go back to our rooms and shut ourselves away.”  John blushed, realizing how desperate his words made him sound.

“We don’t have to,” Sherlock said, eyes fixed on the landscape passing by in the dark.  “Even though I’d just planned on sleeping, company would not be...unwelcome.”

“You what?” John asked, surprise sharpening his tone more than he’d meant it to.

“Nothing,” Sherlock snapped, “It’s--”

“I’d like that,” John cut in, halting Sherlock’s retort.  Sherlock blinked owlishly at him in the sudden glare from the parking lot lights.  

“If you’re sure,” Sherlock responded uncertainly.

“Definitely,” John assented.  They both got out of the car, but when Sherlock moved to close the door, his arm crumpled under him, completely useless.

“Damn,” Sherlock spat, massaging his shoulder in tight, jerky circles.

“Let me see,” John demanded, “What did you do?  Did this happen at the Roylotts’?”

“Nothing new,” Sherlock dismissed, “I’ll be fine.  A hot shower and it’ll be fine.”

“Nope,” John rejected Sherlock’s flippant attitude.  “We’re going to go upstairs, and you’re going to let me see exactly what you’ve done to that shoulder.”

In the room, Sherlock submitted to the prospect of John’s examination with poor grace.  He grumbled as John left him with instructions to dress for bed.  Sherlock had traded his trousers for pyjama pants and he was unbuttoning his shirt and wrenching it off his shoulders when John came back.  

“Let me see,” John said, returning wearing his pyjamas and carrying the unscented hand cream he liked to use on his hands after a long day of washing and rewashing his hands at the clinic.  He thought it would be nice to massage the cramp out of Sherlock’s shoulder.  If he’d let him.  “Jesus, what is all this?” John demanded as he let his fingers trace the shadows and scars of once-deep gouges that marred Sherlock’s back; his shoulder momentarily forgotten.

“The price of my ticket home,” Sherlock said bluntly.

John didn’t know what to say, so instead he silently guided Sherlock down onto the bed so he was lying on his front with the duvet bunched around his waist.  He squeezed some of the hand cream into his palms, and rubbed them together to warm it before he spread his hands with gentle surety across Sherlock’s back and shoulders.  John kept silent as he worked the tension slowly out of his muscles until Sherlock was a somnolent puddle in the middle of the bed.  Mission accomplished, John wiped his hands on a towel and clicked off the bedside lamp before he slipped under the blankets with Sherlock, letting his left hand settle on Sherlock’s bare back, just over his steadily beating heart.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My apologies for the bad science in this chapter. I am neither experienced in keeping poisonous snakes nor in training them to slither through vents and murder people. Sorry. Also, I've changed the chapter count back to a question mark because I'm not sure if there's going to be one or two more chapters. 
> 
> As ever, thank you for your kind comments and kudos. They never fail to brighten my day.


	11. We'll Get There Eventually

Heat.  That was the sensation John woke to the following morning.  He didn’t remember his room having been this warm the night before, but as he shifted and cracked his eyes open, the soft flutter of breath against his shoulder reminded him he wasn’t actually in his room this morning, or even alone for that matter.  John rolled over to face Sherlock, smiling when Sherlock groaned and burrowed further under the duvet.  John trailed his hand down Sherlock’s back, reading the dips and rises of his spine with his fingertips as Sherlock breathed slowly in sleep.  He shuffled closer and let his arm drape across Sherlock’s waist, pulling him tighter against his side.

“I’m sorry I never bothered to _observe_ after you came home,” John whispered into Sherlock’s sleep-mussed hair.  He let his lips rest briefly against where his words had landed, a soft pantomime of a kiss.  A deeper inhale indicated Sherlock’s waking, but John didn’t pull away, refusing to hide himself anymore.  

Sherlock rubbed his face into his pillow as he blinked himself awake under the weight of John’s gaze.  “John,” he rumbled, voice rough from sleep, “You stayed.”

“Of course I did,” John murmured.  He huffed a soft laugh, “Where did you think I’d go?”

Sherlock lifted one shoulder in a self-conscious shrug, “Somewhere else.  Back to your room.  Not here.”  John opened his mouth to offer some sort of reassurance, but Sherlock cut him off, “It doesn’t really matter, though.”  He wriggled sideways until he could drape an arm gently across John’s shoulders.

“Do we need to go back to Helen’s to be there when your snake expert shows up?” John asked, his mind skipping ahead to the practicality of wrapping their investigation up.

“I don’t think so,” Sherlock shook his head, “I sent Dr. Kauffman all the details last night, and Helen said she’d take the day to help her with whatever she needed.”

“Are you telling me we have the whole day to ourselves?” John asked, squeezing Sherlock’s waist.

Sherlock smiled and ducked his head into the pillow, “I suppose, but we do have to be out by eleven.”

“I guess,” John said, reaching over to tug at Sherlock’s hair, “That we should get up and get going back to London then.”

Sherlock scrabbled on the bedside table for his phone, “We don’t have to rush off, it’s only half nine.  Do you want to eat?”

“Sure,” John agreed, “Downstairs or room service?”  Sherlock rolled himself up in the sheet and scowled at the prospect of getting up and dressed, making John burst out laughing, “Okay, we’ll eat here.  I’ll call down.  Do you want anything in particular?”

“Tea and two eggs over easy?”

John nodded, “I can do that.  While I do, you should take a hot shower, try to loosen that shoulder after yesterday.”

“Yes, Doctor,” Sherlock simpered, standing and sashaying into the bathroom with more grace than a lanky git in a bedsheet should ever have.  John rolled his eyes at Sherlock’s retreating back, then turned to see about breakfast.

Even after he’d finished ordering food, Sherlock was still in the shower; apparently, his shoulder was giving him more trouble than he’d been willing to let on.  John glanced at his own phone, the message from Mycroft still waiting patiently in his voicemail.  Sighing as he punched in his passcode, John figured he couldn’t really say he’d moved on with this last message still hanging over him.

“John,” Mycroft’s voice, made tinny by his phone’s tiny speaker, came across as unctuous and unpleasant as ever, “I’m calling to sort out the final details of severing your relationship with the woman known to you as Mary Morstan.  If you would, call me at your earliest convenience.”  John lowered his phone and just stared at it.  What, he wondered, could possibly be left to say after everything else.

“What does my brother want now?” Sherlock asked, plopping down on the bead and breaking into John’s reverie.  In just a towel, he still radiated warmth from the shower, and John longed to lose himself in all the as-yet untapped potential of their few brief kisses from last night.  

“Hmm? Oh, just final followup to my marriage, or the end of it, I guess.”  John shrugged, suddenly disconsolate.  Sherlock searched John’s face for a moment before he reached over to pick up one of his hands.

“I...You know this isn’t really my area,” he said, talking to John’s hand clasped between his own, “Sentiment and all that.”  His huff of self-deprecating laughter made John smile in response, “But you remember my promise.  Anything, anytime.  You only need ask.”  

John wrapped his free hand around Sherlock’s, trying to show him with this simple gesture what he couldn’t yet put into words.  That he didn’t want Sherlock for just a rebound shag or for convenience’s sake.  That he didn’t want to take him for granted or hide from him.  

A knock at the door spared John from his inability to articulate his feelings.  “I’ll get it,” he said with a small smile.  He gently extricated his hand from Sherlock’s grasp and went to answer the door.  A few moments at the door to sign the receipt and collect their food was enough time for Sherlock to get up and exchange his towel for pyjama pants and a shirt, both worn soft with age, and to open the curtains to brighten the room.  

They curled up on the bed with tea, eggs, toast, and sausage, and John couldn’t help but smile at the shockingly domestic figure Sherlock cut lounging in bed immediately post-case.

“Never pegged you for a cuddler,” John smirked after Sherlock had polished off his own food and laid his head in John’s lap and started pinching bites of his sausage off his plate.

Sherlock shrugged and spoke around his mouthful of stolen food, “Haptic communication isn’t new, John.  It’s an easy way to reinforce the positivity and affection from last night.”

“Oh,” John rolled his eyes, “Well if that’s all we’re doing.”  John combed his fingers through Sherlock’s damp hair.  He untangled the knots that remained after Sherlock’s shower and teased the curls back into shape, fluffing each section as he finished.  Sherlock sighed and rolled his head over to let John get at the other side, and John laughed softly, “Just reinforcing positive affection, is it?”

“Mmm,” he hummed into John’s stomach, almost asleep again.

John sat and twirled and teased while Sherlock’s slow, even breath marked time between them.  This was what he’d wanted.  What he’d silently begged for since that afternoon in front of Bart’s.  What he’d finally settled on doing without when he’d cobbled together a new life and sealed it with an “I do.”  What he finally had the chance to take back.

A ping from the nightstand made Sherlock jolt awake.  After a quick scan of the room that looked worryingly like a security sweep to John, he crawled across the bed to retrieve his phone.  “It’s Dr. Kauffman.  Thanking us for connecting her with such a pristine specimen.”  

“The cobra?” John asked, “Is it even a cobra?”

Sherlock curled back into his spot on John’s lap, “Caspian cobra.  You and Google were right.  Extremely poisonous and aggressive.  She’s whisking all of Dr. Roylott’s reptile collection off to a new home with people who will care for them appropriately instead of use them to eliminate members of their family with the aim of laying claim to their money.”

“Well,” John said thoughtfully, “That’s good.  Those poor animals don’t deserve to be some nutter’s weapon of choice.”  A glance at his own phone showed John the morning was starting to get away from them.  He scratched his fingers one more time through Sherlock’s soft hair, “As much as I’d love to just waste the whole day in bed, we should probably get back to London.  That is, if you’re wrapped up here.”

Sherlock nodded, “I am.  There are one or two loose ends, but they can be handled just as easily from London.  I’ll find a train time while you pack.”

“Okay,” John agreed.  He rose and gathered their dirty dishes, “I’ll put the tray out on my way.”

Sherlock hummed distractedly, already clicking quickly through to British Rail’s website.  John shook his head in amusement; some things would never change.

John returned to his room, pausing briefly to deposit their tray outside the door to Sherlock’s room.  Once he was back in his own four walls, the fact that he still owed Mycroft a call reasserted itself.  He settled on the edge of the bed and dialled.

“John,” Mycroft greeted after only one ring, “How nice of you to call.”

“You told me to,” John griped, already feeling his temper rise.  “What else do you need, Mycroft?”

“One of my colleagues has requested a final follow-up before we release you from any connection to Ms. Moran.”

“Fine,” John snapped, “I’m free now, so let’s get this over with.”

“Perfect, I’ll just put you through.”  

A click sounded in John’s ear, and the line went silent.  John pulled the phone away from his ear to check he hadn’t been disconnected, but the call timer was still running, so presumably he was still connected.  As he raised the handset back to his ear, he made a mental note to ask Mycroft why Whitehall couldn’t be bothered with hold muzak.

“Dr. Watson?” The smooth voice of the bloke who’d shown up to his and Mary’s house picked up the other end.

“Uh, yes?  Yes.” John answered, “One of your colleagues had asked me to call and he said you needed to speak to me.”  He was struck by the sudden, hysterical notion that Mycroft went by some sort of ridiculous codename at work.

“Wonderful.  Yes.  Ms. Moran has been adamant in her demands for you to verbally verify that you wish to end your relationship with her.  She’s taking exception to the legal documents you provided yesterday.  Seems convinced we’ve forged your name to try to trick her somehow.”

“What?” John asked, incredulity edging his tone, “Fine.  I’ll tell her myself if that’s what this’ll take.”

“I’d be most appreciative,” his agent sounded completely unflustered by John’s outburst, “Shall I connect you now?”

“Sure.”  Another click.  More silence.  John resisted the urge to check that he was still on the call.  Surely British intelligence could avoid dropped calls if they really needed it.

“John?!”  Mary sounded like she’d been crying.  “Oh, John, thank God.  I’ve missed you.”

“Ms. Moran.”  John’s voice was devoid of recognition.  “One of your handlers told me you were questioning the authenticity of the annulment documents I submitted yesterday.”

“Of course I questioned their authenticity.  We’d talked about all this at Christmas.  We were working through this.  We’re going to be fine.”  She sniffled, “Weren’t we?”

John blinked back the sudden sting behind his eyes, “If I asked you something, would you tell me the truth?”

“You know I would, John,” she whimpered.  “We’re in this together.  Ask me anything.  Anything you want to know and I’ll tell you.”

“Why did you ask me out?” John demanded.  

“Why did I…” Mary repeated, stunned, “John, how could you ask me that?  I was attracted to you right--”

“The _truth_ ,” John snarled.

A defeated sigh filtered over the line, “I was put in your way.  You were meant to notice me.”

“Yeah, I assumed that already.”  John’s voice had completely lost its inflection.  “ _Why_?”

“Insurance.”  Mary lapsed into stubborn silence.  John rolled his eyes.  Prying every single answer out of her was going to take all morning, and he didn’t have that kind of time or patience.

“Insurance against what?” John asked with exaggerated patience.

“Against deception,” she finally caved.  “Jim wanted to make sure Sherlock held up his end of the bargain.  No matter what.”

John clenched his fist where it lay in his lap, “So you were sent to what?  Make sure my grief over my best friend’s death was genuine?”

“I--”

“No.  Don’t.  You tell me the truth right now.”

Her voice, when she answered, sounded her defeat, “Yes.  I was meant to watch you to make sure Sherlock was really dead.”

“And if he wasn’t?” John gritted out, determined to know it all now that he’d broken through her defenses.

“Jim had said I was to eliminate you both.”

“I see,” John nodded.  “So I was just a job, then.”

“No, John, no,” Mary pleaded, “You were so much more than a job--”

“But still a job,” John clarified.  “Makes sense then that the baby’s not mine either.”

“She’s yours in every way that matters,” Mary argued.

“She’s really not,” John laughed mirthlessly.  

John took a deep breath, steeled himself, and took the plunge, “Okay, Mary, this is me officially turning you loose.  No more chances.  No more ‘we’ll work through it.’ No more.”

“So what, you’re just going to run from this?  From us?” Mary demanded, voice hardening.

“No,” John answered calmly, “I’m going to stand here, at a fresh beginning, and you’re going to be removed.  This way you can’t taint what I’ve got, and I can’t be dragged down with you.”  

Instead of waiting for her to answer, John calmly pressed the “end” button on the call.  Silence rushed in around him, but this time John didn’t give himself over to histrionics.  He got up, set his phone down gently on the bed, and went to get his bag.  

Once John had packed all of his things back into his case, he couldn’t stand waiting in the empty hotel room for Sherlock to come fetch him like some sort of parcel, so he grabbed his phone and dashed off a quick text:

_Sherlock, I’ll be waiting for you downstairs._

Down in the lobby, John sank into one of the armchairs facing the front windows.  The weather had turned cold enough for the light snowfall that had begun since they’d woken up to actually stick, and he watched it silently muffle the landscape.  All the flaws hidden beneath a pristine covering.

“John?” Sherlock’s voice broke into his thoughts, “Are you ready?”

John stood and hefted his bag to his shoulder, “Course I am.  Let’s get going.”

Sherlock nodded silently and turned to go to reception to check them out.  John stalked out to the rental, tired of being cooped up indoors.  He threw his bag in the trunk and stood out in the bracing cold blinking against the snow.

Sherlock didn’t say a word all the way to the train station or while they waited on the platform.  He didn’t even speak once they were on the train; he just floated silently at John’s shoulder.

“How much of this did you know?” John burst out after they were well underway.

“How much of what?” Sherlock countered, letting his eyes slide over to the window.

“Don’t give me that, you know _exactly_ what,” John shot back, “How much did you know about the fact that my marriage was nothing more than a wait-and-see contract to the woman I married?”

“I wasn’t ever sure, but I did have my suspicions,” Sherlock hedged.  “But it didn’t seem to matter anyway.  You were happy.  She seemed satisfied.  There was really no point in bringing it up.”

“ _No point_?” John spluttered, “The fact that my wife was thrown into my path to make sure I was actually grieving or else she’d put a bullet in my head wasn’t worth mentioning?”

“John,” Sherlock remonstrated, “There’s really no need for such exaggeration.  If you were in genuine danger, I would have said something.  You weren’t, so I didn’t.  Simple.”

“Sherlock, if I asked you something, would you tell me the truth?”  The irony that he was forcing himself to ask the same question twice in a single morning did not escape his notice.

“Yes.”

“Had you ever seen Mary before you came back?”  A fear that had been nagging John since his conversation with Sherlock early last evening reasserted itself.

“Seen?  No.  Heard of?  Yes.”  Sherlock had stopped looking out the window and was now looking straight at John.  “She was, I was told, stationed at the pool the night we met Moriarty.  She and a colleague, David, I would assume, were hired by Moriarty to ensure he gained our full cooperation that night.  After that, she was kept on retainer, he was let go.  Difference in skill, I would imagine.  Anyway, all of my sources indicated that while she wasn’t actively involved in my final encounter with Moriarty, she already had the orders that would plant her with you.”

“Why the _fuck_ wasn’t I told any of this?” John hissed.

Sherlock shrugged, “I can’t speak to my time abroad, and by the time I got home, all her behaviour suggested she either realised there would be no one to guarantee her the final payout for finishing her assignment or she had, as she says, stopped seeing you as a job and started seeing you as a romantic interest.”

“That really doesn’t answer my question, Sherlock,” John shook his head and sat back, crossing his arms.  He waited.

“I,” Sherlock hesitated.  “I would prefer to discuss this in a less public venue.”

“Fine, but we’re not letting this go,” John agreed sullenly.

Sullen became the watchword for the rest of their journey.  Sherlock alternated between pecking at his phone and staring thoughtfully out the window.  John tried to settle down enough to read; however, the rapid downward trajectory of his morning, coupled with his inability to articulate an apology for taking out his anger at his ex-wife on someone he held so dear, had left him fractious and restless.  

Back at Baker Street, Sherlock let them in, but quickly disappeared up the stairs.  John trailed him up into their flat, wishing for some way to retrieve their intimacy from earlier.  He could hear Sherlock banging around in his bedroom when he made it into the sitting room.  

Sighing, John tossed his own bag at the foot of the stairs leading up to his room and set the kettle on to boil.  While the water heated, he rummaged through the fridge for some tomatoes and a blob of mozzarella for a bit of lunch.  The routine of cooking helped to busy his hands and to settle his thoughts into a more rational framework.  They clearly needed to discuss the notion that lying by omission was still lying.  They should probably also squeeze in a Relationship Discussion; although, two heavy emotional things would probably be pushing it for one day.  

“John?”  Sherlock’s soft interruption scattered John’s thoughts to the four winds.  He turned from the counter to see Sherlock hesitating on the far side of the kitchen.  “I’m,” he looked down and fiddled with a petri dish left out on the table, “I’m sorry.”

John set the knife down and turned to face his friend, “I know.”  A pause.  “I just don’t understand why you keep withholding things from me.  Important things, I might add.”

Sherlock nodded.

“So come on, then,” John prodded, “Why didn’t you bother to tell me any of this?”

“It wasn’t the right time,” Sherlock responded simply.  

“Would you stop _bullshitting_ me and just answer?” John shouted; his frayed patience tearing completely.

“How exactly am I ‘bullshitting’ you, John?” Sherlock snapped back, rising to the bait.  “Is it when I stayed out of your way because you made it quite clear you didn’t want to see me after I came back?  Is it when I ignored my own feelings and helped you plan the wedding you wanted?  Perhaps it was when I allowed you to decide how you wanted to proceed with Mary?  All I’ve ever tried to do is give you what you’ve indicated you wanted.  So, yes, I am sorry.”  Sherlock slammed down the petri dish he’d been rolling between his hands then turned and retreated to his bedroom.

“Sherlock, I--,” but the slamming door silenced him.

“Goddammit!” John shouted to the empty kitchen.  Without Sherlock in the room, John’s anger rapidly deflated into a simmering self-loathing.  “Goddammit,” he whispered.

 

~~*~~

 

Appetite vanished, John stored the tomatoes and cheese back in the fridge before retreating to his own room.  He put on pyjamas and curled up on top of the duvet instead of unpacking and while he traced the pattern of creases that meandered across the duvet, he forced himself to address Sherlock’s reaction rationally.  

Introspection was hardly his forte, but John, at the end of a few hours’ careful thought, had realized two things.  First, he recognized that Sherlock’s answer on the train had been exactly that.  An answer.  Just because it hadn’t been an answer he’d _liked_ did not stop it being the best one Sherlock had to give.  Second, he admitted that he’d been awfully selfish.  Sherlock had indicated that he’d kept the details of Mary’s past to himself for the simple fact that it hadn’t been his story to tell.  He’d left John and Mary to conduct their relationship as they’d seen fit, at the expense of his own feelings no less.

John sighed and sat up.  He’d been a right prat about this whole thing.  Trust Issues.  He always seemed to circle back to that.  He’d not, ultimately, been able to trust Mary, but he had, just like that first night, still been willing to trust Sherlock.  Now he just had to gird his loins and actually tell Sherlock that.

He descended the stairs back into the main part of the flat.  Sherlock’s door was still resolutely shut, but now that John had worked up the nerve, he refused to be put off.  He padded softly down the hall, and knocked gently at the bedroom door.

“What?” Sherlock’s voice came through the door, muffled and toneless.

“Can, uh, can I come in?” John asked, forcing himself not to shuffle from one foot to the other like a guilty child while he waited.

The hesitation from the other side of the door was so long that John nearly lost his nerve, but just when he was about to turn and beat a hasty retreat, the door opened.  Sherlock was still dressed from their trip; armour still in place.

“Did you need something?” he asked, his tone overly polite while his body blocked John from the rest of his bedroom.

“Yeah, actually,” John answered, proud of how level his voice came out.  “I wanted to talk to you about earlier.”

Sherlock stepped out of his room and gestured to John to precede him into the lounge.  Hurt by the impersonal treatment, John turned and went where he’d been directed, sitting in his chair, but leaning forward in anticipation of the conversation he was determined to keep control of this time.  Sherlock followed him and settled into his leather chair.  He crossed his legs and steepled his hands in front of his mouth.  John felt like a client.

“I, uh, well, I’m not sure where to start,” John stammered.  He blushed.  Jesus, he had come to Sherlock wanting to talk.

“Just start at the beginning,” Sherlock suggested.

“Christ, I’m not even sure where the beginning is anymore,” John admitted.  Sherlock smiled softly at that.  

“Okay, so, I’ve been doing some thinking,” John hedged, suddenly terrified he’d say the wrong thing and drive Sherlock into isolation again.

“Mmm,” Sherlock hummed noncommittally.

John forged ahead, “Right, well, I’ve been thinking, and I’ve realized a couple things.”  He paused and glanced up from where he’d been staring at his hands twisted together in his lap.  Sherlock just blinked back at him, giving nothing away.  Fine, they were going to do this the hard way.  

“First, I owe you an apology.  You did give me an answer on the train.  Just because I didn’t like it didn’t give me the right to treat you the way I did, so I’m sorry.”

“Thank you, John,” Sherlock said.  “I didn’t mean to mislead you; I assumed you would have appreciated circumspection since we were in public.”

“I do, that is to say, I should have,” John smiled, heartened by the thawing he could hear in Sherlock’s voice.

“So the second thing.”  John took a deep breath, “It’s a bit of a muddle, actually.”

“In your own time,” Sherlock encouraged.

“But quite quickly?” John smirked.

“The best things in life are never rushed, John,” Sherlock chided.

“I’ve realized something about me, you, and us,” John started.  Sherlock raised an eyebrow, and John pushed on, “I’ve realized that I don’t really trust anyone like I trust you.”

It was Sherlock’s turn to avert his eyes and blush.

“I’ve realized you’ll give up anything if it means I’m happy.”

Sherlock’s fond smile said more than any words ever could.

“I’ve realized we’re much more together than we could ever be alone.”

“I must admit, I am impressed, John.”  There was no trace of the usual sarcasm Sherlock employed when he complimented someone.  

“All this self-reflection does come with a cost, though,” John said, leaning forward.

“What would that be?” Sherlock asked.

“Honesty.  No more lying, not even by omission.  I can’t spend my life wondering if you’re giving me the whole story.  It’s not fair to me and it’ll tear us apart.”

“I understand,” Sherlock replied.  “It was presumptuous of me to decide for you which details were relevant and which were unimportant.  You mustn’t be too shy to ask, though; I am many things, but clairvoyant is not one of them.”

“Fair enough.”  John smiled.  

He got up and went to where Sherlock was still sitting and held out his hands.  Sherlock took them, and John pulled him to his feet, “I know we should probably have some sort of Relationship Talk to sort out what we’re doing and where we’re headed, but I think I’d rather spend the rest of the evening doing a bit of nothing.”

“Why must we label anything?” Sherlock asked, “I think we’ve sorted what we need to for now, so why can’t we enjoy it before throwing ourselves into more emotional contortions?”

“Okay,” John conceded.  He reached out and wrapped an arm around Sherlock’s waist and smiled to himself when Sherlock snaked his own arm around John’s shoulders.  “We’ll figure it out.  We’ve got time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One chapter left! If you like your stories PG, then feel free to stop here. If you've been hanging around for the smut, that's coming (ha, ha) in Chapter 12.


	12. Where You Belong

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note the rating change!

In the days following their trip to Leatherhead and their conversation, John watched Sherlock retreat into himself.  John took two days to get all his things unpacked and resettled, and the whole time he was working, sorting, hanging, he kept hoping Sherlock would wander up the stairs and sit on the edge of his bed and talk to him about the toxin experiment he’d taken up after they’d gotten home.  Anything to distract himself from the way they were suddenly not talking.  But Sherlock stayed downstairs with his chunks of pig flesh and hypodermics of snake venom.  John could hear him rattling away at all hours of the day and night.  He wanted to ask what Sherlock was up to, but every time he passed through the kitchen, Sherlock was bent over the table in uncommunicative contemplation.  Late in the afternoon on the third day, John ran out of things to reorganize, so since Sherlock wouldn’t come to him, he decided he would go to Sherlock.

“Hey,” John called as he came down the stairs, “D’you think if I called Mycroft he could get the rest of my stuff released from my old house?”

Sherlock shrugged without looking up from where he was making notes about a blackened sample of pig, “I’m sure he could.”

“Well, do you think he would?”

Sherlock closed his notebook and regarded John thoughtfully, “He called this morning and told me Ms. Moran won’t be handed over to the CIA until at least next week.”

John slumped in his seat, “So getting me into the house might be a stretch even for him, then?”

“I’m afraid so.  At least for now.”  Sherlock fixed his eyes on his fingers and twiddled his pen nervously.

John reached out and stilled Sherlock’s hand, “Why don’t we go out tonight?  Dinner?  Just the two of us.”

“I’m not really hungry, but we can go out, if you’d like,” Sherlock replied, smiling shyly.

John released Sherlock’s hand with a squeeze, “I do.  Let’s go somewhere cosy and make a time of it.”

Sherlock rose and began boxing up his pig samples and unused vials of venom.  John nodded and stood to get himself ready, “Don’t forget to wash your hands before we go.  I don’t really fancy a trip to A&E because you had venom on your hands.”

“John,” Sherlock smirked, “Do you really think so little of me?”

“I never know what to think of you, to be perfectly honest,” John laughed.  Sherlock caught his eye and offered his own shy smile.  John’s stomach flipped at the gentle extension of the intimacy from their trip.

Down on Baker Street, Sherlock turned towards Marylebone and John fell in step with him.  Sherlock ducked into a quaint looking location that billed itself as a genuine Viennese cafe.  Once they were seated though, John didn’t have the stomach for much beyond a coffee and a bit of pastry.  

“John,” Sherlock murmured, staring down at his hands, “I’ve, ah, been meaning to tell you something.”

“Oh,” John scooted his chair forward and leaned in to hear Sherlock over the babble of the other patrons, “Okay.  What is it?”

Just like he had the morning in Leatherhead, Sherlock picked John’s hand up and spoke to it rather than directly to John, “I’ve spent a great deal of time thinking since we came home, and I--”

The waitress’s arrival with their drinks made Sherlock fling down John’s hand and blush furiously.  She deposited their order with a smile and turned to leave.  Sherlock didn’t resume his earlier thought, instead he focused on pouring sugar into his coffee and watching his spoon swirl in the depths of his cup with the kind of intense examination he normally reserved for dead things.

John added milk and sugar to his own cup, stirred, and drank, but when Sherlock stayed silent, he prompted, “You’ve been thinking?”

“Hmm?  Oh, yes.”  He nodded, but then seemed to change his mind with a quick shake of his head, “It’s nothing.”

“Sherlock,” John scolded, “I know you, and if you’ve taken time to think about it, it’s not ‘nothing.’”

“I’ve been thinking,” Sherlock tried again, blushing, “About how glad I am that you’re back.”  His blush deepened, “That you’re home.”

John blinked, startled at Sherlock’s unvarnished honesty.  “I’m glad to be home too.”  He reached out and squeezed Sherlock’s hand where it rested on the handle of his cup, “I’ve missed this, you know.  Us.”

“So,” John prompted after they’d sat in silence for a bit, “What’re you hoping to prove with this pig and venom setup?”

“Rate of necrosis mainly,” Sherlock answered.  “Pig is the closest analog to human flesh, but with no active immune response, this would let me establish a baseline for rates of decay from different venoms.  It’s fascinating.  I can’t believe I’d never thought to do it before now.”

“Must be,” John laughed, “I think the last time I saw you stay up nights with no immediate case on was that study you did on chemical burns from ingesting household cleaners.  You remember, right after I broke it off with Natalie.”

“Hmm,” Sherlock hummed, “That was a productive experiment.  That’s not the only thing I’ve been thinking about,” Sherlock shook his head, “I mean, it is a part, yes, but, well…” he trailed off.

John set down his empty cup and leaned into Sherlock’s space, their easy conversation making him bold, “Tell me what you think about when you stay up nights?”

Sherlock watched the dregs swirl at the bottom of his own cup before he looked up and caught John’s eye, “All kinds of things.  The psychological impact of living alone versus living with a close friend, necrotising flesh, and planning an analysis of the rate of repetitive stress injuries in habitual computer gamers.  You see, lots of things.”

John chuckled, “I’m honoured to rank with rotting pig and RSI.  Really.”  

Sherlock opened his mouth to protest, but John forestalled any rebuttal by leaning in and kissing him squarely on the mouth.  When he pulled back, Sherlock just blinked back at him, “John...I...what was that for?”

John smirked and shook his head, “What do you always say?  ‘You see but you do not observe?’”  Sherlock nodded.  “Well, what do you observe about this?”  With that, John stole another kiss, letting his lips linger on Sherlock’s this time.  He could taste the rich, dark hints of  Sherlock’s espresso when he let his tongue dart out to tease at Sherlock’s lips and the deeper, bitter notes when Sherlock let his own tongue tease back.

When they broke apart, Sherlock was breathless, and he rested his forehead against John’s and grinned, “I suppose I could tell you what I’ve observed, but I can say with a fair degree of certainty it would get us thrown out.”

“Then let’s get out of here, and you can tell me all about it,” John answered.  He stood and held out his hand.  Sherlock glanced up at him before slipping his hand into John’s outstretched palm and rising.  

Out on the street, Sherlock tucked John’s hand into the crook of his arm as they started for home in the deepening twilight.  They walked a couple of blocks in companionable quiet, but while they waited for the lights to change at the corner, Sherlock started shifting anxiously.

“John, I...I’m not sure what you’re expecting, but--”

“Sherlock,” John interrupted gently, “Here’s what I’m expecting.  We’re going to go home.  We’re going to do what feels right and feels good and we’re not going to worry about the rest of it.  We’ve got time, remember?”  He squeezed Sherlock’s arm where he was still holding it, and Sherlock smiled, a true, open thing that lit his whole face and nodded. 

Back at Baker Street, Sherlock stripped off his coat and scarf in a swirl of wool and cashmere, but once he’d hung them up, he hesitated in the middle of their sitting room, watching as John shed and hung his own coat.

John sidled over to where Sherlock stood in uncharacteristic uncertainty, “Hey, genius.”  Sherlock’s ghost of a smile encouraged John to wrap his arms around Sherlock’s waist, “Stay out here?  Or bedroom?”

Sherlock shook his head.  A beat went by then, “My bed’s got clean sheets on it.”

John laughed and stepped back into the kitchen, dragging Sherlock by his hands, “Was that supposed to be subtle?”

“I’m--”

“No, don’t,” John interrupted.  He kissed Sherlock’s stunned mouth, “Don’t you dare apologize,” he whispered into the breath between them.

Sherlock nodded then leaned in to capture John’s mouth.  He let his tongue flick gently against John’s lips, and John sighed into the contact, letting Sherlock’s tongue sneak in to tangle with his own.  John grabbed Sherlock’s hands where they were fluttering nervously against the waistband of his jeans and planted them firmly around his hips.  Sherlock gripped hard, like his hands around John’s waist were the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth, and John closed his own fingers around Sherlock’s slim wrists and ran his fingers in slow circles around the thin skin of his inner wrists.

“Now,” John murmured, leaning up to press a kiss to the corner of Sherlock’s jaw and run a hand slowly down his side, “Here’s what I’d like.”  Another kiss landed on the side of his neck.  Sherlock just nodded mutely.  “I’d like,” a kiss further down his neck and a squeeze at his waist, “for us to go in there.”  He nodded towards Sherlock’s room.  “For us to get undressed,” John pulled down the collar of Sherlock’s shirt to gently bite at his collar bone.  “And to get into your bed and for me to touch you and you to touch me.”

“I--” Sherlock cleared his throat, “I think that would be possible.”

John’s eyes sparked clear and bright, “Good.”  He stepped back from where he still had Sherlock pinned against the wall and resumed pulling him down the hall, “Come on, then.”

In Sherlock’s room, John flipped on the lamp to bathe the room in a warm, golden glow.  He kicked off his shoes and socks and stripped off his jumper and jeans before he flopped back onto Sherlock’s bed.  He propped a pillow up against the headboard and wriggled around to get comfortable against it.  Sherlock, meanwhile, was working through the buttons on his shirt with concentration that belied the simple nature of the task.

“Hey,” John broke into Sherlock’s silent contemplation of his shirt placket, “Come here?”

Sherlock came over and stood next to the bed.  John rolled to sit on the edge of the bed then picked up his right wrist and unbuttoned the cuff, “Alright?” he asked, kissing Sherlock’s pulse point.

“Yes,” Sherlock murmured.

“Excellent,” John smiled, unbuttoning his other cuff and kissing the blue veins he found there too.  “Off,” he said, yanking on Sherlock’s shirt tails.

While Sherlock pulled his shirt off, John went to work tugging at his belt buckle.  “Do you know how long I’ve waited to do this?” John asked as he shimmied Sherlock’s belt out of the loops.

“Ah-assuming your line of questioning at Angelo’s meant what I thought it did, approximately two thousand days,” Sherlock stammered, shivering as John stroked his warm hands over bare skin.  

John ran his hands across Sherlock’s stomach and around to grip his waist, “Well it did,” he said and bent to kiss Sherlock’s bare skin just over the button of his trousers. “So,” he said, smirking as he glanced up through the pale fringe of his eyelashes, “I think we’ve waited long enough, don’t you?”

At Sherlock’s nod, John unbuttoned and unzipped his trousers and slid them and Sherlock’s pants slowly down his narrow hips.  He smoothed his hands back up Sherlock’s bare legs, smiling when Sherlock’s legs twitched as John’s fingers tickled over his skin, exploring the newly bared flesh.  “Come on, then,” he murmured, patting the bed next to him.

Sherlock ignored John’s invitation in favour of straddling his lap.  He smiled and let his fingers trail lightly across John’s shoulders and down across his chest, exploration of his own.  John’s muscles jumped under the feather-light touch, and he collapsed back onto the bed, laughing as he pulled Sherlock with him

Sherlock spluttered as he fell against John’s chest, his own laughter a soft rumble.  He rolled off and sprawled himself casually against the pillows before holding out his arms and beckoning imperiously to John to join him.  

John crawled after him, settling between Sherlock’s legs.  “What would you like?” John asked, “Just say the word and it’s yours.”

Sherlock screwed up his face in a parody of his normal thoughtful moue, “I...would like to feel all of you against all of me.”

“Done,” John smiled.  With that, he leaned in and proceeded to follow the scattering of freckles down Sherlock’s neck and chest with wet, sucking kisses.  Sherlock’s soft sighs and quietly pleased humming spurred John’s progress, and when he sank lower, he gently nipped at the one freckle that sat right above Sherlock’s belly button.

“Oh, John,” Sherlock sighed softly.  John smiled against Sherlock’s stomach when he felt those long, elegant fingers gently thread through his hair.

“Like that, do you?” He murmured into Sherlock’s pale skin.  When he looked up past the shallow rise and fall of Sherlock’s chest, he caught Sherlock’s eye and smirked at him.  Much to John’s delight, Sherlock’s answering smile was a little hazy around the edges.

John wrapped his arms around Sherlock’s back, making him close his eyes and sigh as he arched his spine into a lovely sinuous curve.  John returned his attention to his meandering path down Sherlock’s torso, letting his mouth lead him down the rest of Sherlock’s stomach and over the crest of his hip.  

John took his time as he let himself sink lower, let himself drown in the taste of soap and clean sweat on Sherlock’s skin beneath his lips.  He mouthed gently down the crease of Sherlock’s thigh then licked slowly up the length of his rapidly hardening cock.  He swirled his tongue slowly around the head, gently teasing and tormenting until Sherlock’s soft gasps turned to quiet moans.

“We’re going to need lube at some point in the very near future,” John panted, resting his forehead against Sherlock’s thigh.

“I...erm...I think I’ve got some in the bedside table,” Sherlock stammered.  He unclenched his fingers from the sheet and gestured vaguely over John’s shoulder to the bedside table.  John nodded and rolled over.  He pulled open the drawer and rifled past a notebook, spare phone charger, and a lighter until his hand closed around a sleek bottle.

“This’ll do the trick,” John affirmed.  He quickly scanned the label to see what, exactly, they were dealing with when another thought occurred to him.  “Oh, um, shit.  I guess we might need condoms too.”

“I don’t have any of those,” Sherlock muttered, blushing to the roots of his hair.

“I do,” John said and smacked a quick kiss onto Sherlock’s cheek.  “Back in a tick.”  

He jumped up and pattered quickly up the stairs to his room.  A dig through his own bedside table netted him a mostly empty box of Durex.  He smiled and shook the box in triumph.

“I found them,” John announced as he trotted back down the stairs, “Now, where were--”  He trailed off when he came into Sherlock’s room and found Sherlock sprawled across the bed stroking himself slowly.  “Hey, what’s this?  Getting started without me?”

“Well--” Sherlock started.

“No, don’t stop,” John cut in, “You look gorgeous like this.”  John set the box down on the bedside table and leaned in for a kiss.  

Their kiss started off slowly, but the feel of Sherlock arching up into his own hand as John pulled him closer with an arm and a leg rapidly added heat.  John let his hand snake down to join Sherlock’s, their fingers tangling together as they found a shared rhythm.  John lost himself in the smooth slide of their hands, the gentle give and take of lips and tongue, the soft pressure of Sherlock’s free hand as it slid slowly up and down his back.

“John,” Sherlock murmured between kisses.

“Hmm?” John hummed, skimming his lips across Sherlock’s one more time.

“I like this,” Sherlock said shyly, “But, I would like to try, um…”

“What?” John encouraged, “Don’t be shy.”

Sherlock’s face flamed scarlet, “Penetration.”

“Yeah?”  John sat up, “I mean we can, if you’re sure, but I don’t want you to feel…” he trailed off, unsure where he was really going.

Sherlock sat up and put his arms around John’s waist, “I’m sure, John.  I’m no libertine to be sure, but I trust you.  I want this.”

“Okay then,” John grinned.  He pushed Sherlock onto his back and crawled over him, “Like this, or…?”

“Like this,” Sherlock gasped bucking up to meet John as he rolled his hips into Sherlock’s.

John snagged the lube off the bedside table and flipped the lid open to pour some out onto his fingers.  He rubbed them together, warming the liquid between his fingers, then leaned down to push Sherlock’s legs further apart. “You tell me if something doesn’t feel good, yeah?”

“Of course,” Sherlock agreed.

“Good,” John nodded.  

He settled himself between Sherlock’s long, lean legs and stroked down his fully erect cock.  He let his fingers trail down, down until he could tease Sherlock’s arse.  He rained kisses down on Sherlock’s thighs while he circled a single digit gently until he felt Sherlock relax under him and he let his index finger slip in.  

Anticipation seemed to have been the worst part for Sherlock because John heard him sigh and felt him sink into the mattress once he’d made his initial push.  John twisted his finger experimentally then smiled and nipped at Sherlock’s hip in response to his low groan.  He licked his way lavishly up the length of Sherlock’s cock then wrapped his lips around him and established a smooth, gliding rhythm with his mouth and his fingers fell into a gentle counterpoint, sliding and twisting in perfect complement.  

“John,” Sherlock mumbled, “This is nice.”

John peeked up from where he was lying between Sherlock’s legs and grinned, “I think I can do better than nice, don’t you?”

“Mmm, I’m sure,” Sherlock replied, smiling.

John retrieved the lube from where he’d let it drop next to Sherlock’s hip and added a bit more to his fingers and started teasing with a second finger.  He turned his mouth back to Sherlock’s cock, and when he felt Sherlock’s head drop back against the pillow, he slid his middle finger in to join the first.  He alternately sucked and stroked and teased until Sherlock was a moaning, writhing mess above him.  

“John...John,” Sherlock panted, grabbing John’s right hand where it rested on the sheets next to his hip.

“Hmm?” John hummed around Sherlock’s cock.

“I-I want you,” Sherlock gasped, “Now, please.”

“Your wish,” John smirked.  He sat up and fished a condom out of the box, but his lube-slicked fingers made him clumsy and John cursed at the foil slipping through his grasp.  

Laughing, Sherlock sat up and snatched it out of his hand, “Let me.  With hands like those, you’ll never get it.”  He tore the wrapper easily and tossed it away then reached out to wrap long, slender fingers around John’s cock.   

“Oh, Jesus, that’s nice,” he groaned and arched into Sherlock’s touch, shuddering at the deft twist of Sherlock’s wrist when he reached the head.  

Sherlock grinned in response then set to rolling the condom down around John’s cock, the tip of his tongue poking out with his concentration.  Once he’d gotten it all the way on, Sherlock leaned back and watched John run his lube-slicked hand over himself.  Raising his eyes to meet Sherlock’s, John was pleased to see how glazed they’d gone at the sight of John touching himself.  He leaned back into Sherlock’s space and kissed him, nipping gently at his lower lip.

“How do you want to do this?” he murmured between kisses.

Sherlock licked his lips, “I’d like to see you.”

“Good,” John hummed, “I want to see you too.”  One more kiss, then John gently pushed at Sherlock’s shoulder, “lay down, then.”

Sherlock laid back down, and John curled over him, leaving light, fluttering kisses across his cheeks.  He caught Sherlock’s hand in his and squeezed his fingers as he eased himself slowly forward, gasping at the tight heat of Sherlock’s body.  Once John was in, he waited until Sherlock’s soft pants resolved into a long sigh and he ran his legs up John’s thighs to wrap them around his waist.  John gave his hips a tentative roll, and Sherlock moaned and arched into him.  Sherlock grabbed John’s forearms and rocked himself back onto his cock.  

“Beautiful,” John murmured, thrusting into Sherlock’s willing body with a little more force as Sherlock pushed back insistently to meet him.  The flex and relax of Sherlock’s abdomen in time with their motion and the low moans Sherlock couldn’t keep back mesmerized him, “God, Sherlock,” John groaned.  Sherlock’s hands flexed against John’s arms, a soft counterpoint to the increasing pace of the rest of their bodies; a tiny act that was less about fucking and more about loving.  

Before long, John felt the coil of his own orgasm starting to tighten low in his belly, but he wanted this to be about their shared enjoyment, not just his.  “Touch yourself; I want to see you,” he begged.  Sherlock reached between them to stroke himself, and John smiled at the tickle of Sherlock’s knuckles as they gently teased over his stomach.  

Sherlock’s face at the height of his pleasure was incandescent.  His eyes, which had been fixed on John, fell closed and his mouth went slack and he said John’s name on a long, low groan.  All the rest of his muscles contracted as he came over his own hand.  The sight, coupled with Sherlock tightening around John’s cock pushed him closer, and in a handful of deep, luxurious thrusts later, he climaxed, shuddering.  

Sherlock ran his hands up John’s arms and over his shoulders until he could thread his fingers through the short, soft hair at the back of John’s head, “John,” he breathed, “That was…fantastic.”

John laughed at the sound of his well-worn compliment coming out of Sherlock’s mouth, “You think so?”

“Oh, yes,” he purred, rolling his hips one last time as John pulled out.  

“Back in a sec,” John said over his shoulder.  A quick trip to the loo let him dispose of the condom and fetch a damp flannel, but when he came back, Sherlock was curling himself into the duvet.  “Hey, no, I’m not sleeping in dirty sheets, you prat,” John scolded without real heat.

“Oh, fine,” Sherlock conceded and held out his hand for the flannel.  A perfunctory scrub later, Sherlock hurled the flannel at the open bathroom door while John just rolled his eyes.  “Bed, John?”

John slipped beneath the duvet with Sherlock, marvelling at his warm, sinuous weight as Sherlock wrapped himself around John’s torso.  “Goodnight, Sherlock,” John sighed and clicked off the bedroom lamp.

 

~~*~~

 

John woke the next morning to an empty bed and the sun in his eye.  He groaned and rolled over, wanting to preserve the contentment of waking up slowly after a lovely night.  The clock said half eight, which meant he really should get up and get his day underway, but the warm afterglow of the night before meant he couldn’t quite face the tedium of a “normal” day.  Morning afters were for lazy kisses and late brunch and lounging in a pair of pinched pyjama bottoms, so instead of putting on his clothes from the day before, he rolled himself into Sherlock’s flat sheet.

In the kitchen, fresh coffee still sat in the pot, and in the sitting room, Sherlock was sat at the desk poring over his notes from the past few days, his own cup forgotten at his elbow.  John smiled at the shockingly domestic figure Sherlock cut sitting in his pyjamas reading while morning sun streamed through the lounge windows.  He wanted this to become their new normal, so he poured himself a mug and went to sit with Sherlock.

Sherlock glanced up from his notes and smiled at John as he sat down, “Good morning, John.”

“Morning,” John murmured, taking a sip of his coffee, “Sleep okay?”

“Mmm,” Sherlock hummed and closed his notebook to give John his full attention, “John, about last night--”

“Wait,” John interrupted slightly panicked, “It was okay, wasn’t it?  You wanted what we did, yeah?”

“Yes, of course,” Sherlock snapped waving John’s concern away, “What I meant was, I didn’t want it to have been a one-off.” He paused, “Don’t want it to have been.”

John felt the knot that had developed in his stomach at the words ‘about last night’ uncoil, “Good.  That’s, um, that’s good.  Me too.  There’s just one thing--”

“John,” it was Sherlock’s turn to interrupt.  “I’ve been doing a bit of thinking, and I need you to understand something.”

“Okay,” John nodded, still nervous, “Whatever it is, I’m sure we can work through it.”

“No, no, nothing like that,” Sherlock shook his head.  He raised his eyes to meet John’s, “I just need you to understand that while my decisions to lie to you in the past were always rooted in good intentions, I have come to the conclusion that the benefits to honesty far outweigh any perceived momentary gains from dishonesty.”

John blinked, “Sherlock...I...don’t know what to say…”

“You needn’t say anything right this instant.  Some things are best thought on first.”

“I’ve had a long time to think,” John said, “And I know what I want.”  Sherlock sat silently, looking like he scarcely dared hope he would get the answer he wanted.  John, ever the man of action, leaned in and kissed him.

“I’m glad you’re home, John,” Sherlock murmured.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it! 
> 
> First of all, I'm so sorry this final chapter took me so long. Real life reared up and kicked my butt. But it's here now, and that's what matters!
> 
> Second, thank you to everyone who's joined me on this adventure. Kestrel337, this would never have made it past chapter 3 if it wasn't for your constant support and encouragement. For everyone who's read, left kudos, and kind words, you've pushed me to keep going because you were as excited about this as I am.


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